Wildflower Classrooms
by all-the-angels
Summary: Nezumi, a young teacher, and Shion, a first year student, cross paths in the school library and bond over Shakespeare. What will become of their relationship, and how far are the two of them willing to go for the sake of each other?
1. Chapter 1

A loud, blaring alarm broke the silence of the early morning; it's monotonous drone extracting a resigned groan from the man laying in bed. He stretched his arm out and brought his fist down onto the clock, sighing deeply as the sound ceased and he was met with the resumed silence that such an early morning brought. Mornings were, generally, always unpleasant to him, but this morning was particularly painful; the first morning of the new semester. Not just any semester, but the beginning of an entire new school year. So that meant that this spring there would be an entirely new class of mindless first years aimlessly wandering around the school grounds, chatting with their friends as though school was now a place for socializing instead of learning. Or maybe it was at that point. He wasn't sure, he hadn't been a student for a number of years now. Now that he thought about it, he had never really enjoyed his years in school in the first place; so why had he decided to teach?

The man sighed once more before dragging himself out of bed, glancing out the window and the still dark sky with tired eyes. It was spring, so why weren't mornings light yet? He was, as well as a serious man, an impatient one. He wanted it to be warm outside so that students would stop trailing remaining traces of snow and damp grass and mud into the building; as a teacher, he was expected to help clean up. Sure the students always had their cleaning duties, but they were slackers. But that's what he always thought about children, so maybe he was biased. Maybe. Probably.

Suddenly, his phone went off and broke him from his reverie. He grabbed the phone off his bedside table and opened it, bringing it to his ear and answering it with an unpleasant, "What?"

"Hey, Nezumi. Someone's cheerful this morning," The gruff voice of his friend and fellow teacher, Inukashi, mumbled from the other line. "Just making sure you were up and hadn't forgotten the new semester has started."

"When have I ever forgotten?"

"Last semester."

"Yeah, well, I remembered," Nezumi grumbled, placing his phone between his shoulder and his cheek as he pulled on clean clothes. He tugged on his pants and glanced at the clock. "I didn't think you got up this early."

"I have to walk my dogs," Inukashi said offhandedly through the phone, and Nezumi nodded in understanding although he knew his friend couldn't see it. Inukashi owned several dogs, each of them special and precious to their owner in a different and important way. "I could say the same thing to you."

"I always wake up early," Nezumi informed Inukashi. "Anyway, I have to get ready. I'll see you there."

"Bye."

Nezumi wasn't much of a conversationalist.

* * *

Mornings were kind of exciting, in Shion's opinion; you never knew what it was going to be like when you woke up. You could be tired, you could be alert, it could be warm or it could be cold or maybe everything would fall exactly into the places where you wanted them to, neatly and exactly as planned. Of course, that very rarely happened, but that was just fine to Shion because he liked it when things weren't the way they were supposed to be. There was no riddle to that.

This morning happened to be an especially exciting one; he was starting high school that day, the first day of the spring semester and the new year. He jumped out of bed the moment his alarm went off, excited for absolutely anything that could happen. Shion was quite the optimist.

"Shion? Are you awake yet?"

"Yes!" Shion said, turning around from where he was sitting on his bed to smile at his mother, who was hovering in his doorway. He finished buttoning up his shirt, his new uniform for the new high school he was attending, and stood up; he stretched his arms above his head and yawned, shaking his head to try and rid himself of some of his sleepiness, his snow white hair sprinkling drops of water from his shower onto his shoulders and the ground around him. He grinned at his mother and shoved his hands in his pockets. "Been awake for a while."

"How very unlike you," His mother remarked, walking further into his room as Shion grabbed his tie off of his desk, pulling it on and tying it as neatly as he could manage. "Well, don't you look smart!"

Shion smiled again and shrugged, looking out the window where the sky was just starting to grow light again.

* * *

"I hate the new year," Nezumi grumbled, leaning against the frame of the doorway in his classroom, Inkuashi leaning against the wall besides him as they watched the students bustle through the hallway. Some faces they recognized while some were entirely unfamiliar; Inukashi and Nezumi split classes between classes 3A and 3B, and their classes were second years this year, but some were escorting or being escorted by older and younger siblings, some with uniforms that were too small or ones that were too big, and people shrieking with delight that their friends were in their class, and probably would be for the next three years. Their school rarely changed who was in what class, though it was customary it was also a hassle, so Nezumi assumed he wasn't going to be getting or losing any students. When the bell finally rang, and students rushed to get to their classrooms, Inukashi and Nezumi said a weary goodbye and went to teach for the first time since Winter break had begun.

Nezumi taught English Literature; and he absolutely loved it. He loved all of the classics the most, like Romeo and Juliet or Hamlet. This year, now that his students knew more English and could speak and read the language in near fluency, he thought he might start reading Romeo and Juliet to them. Or maybe Macbeth, but it seemed far too morbid and a little too symbolic for those who still couldn't speak English with proper grammar.

His current students were fine, he supposed; they weren't too obnoxious, though there was always that certain student who wouldn't stop talking and trying to seem cool in front of everyone. Nezumi always hated those students (though he would never admit that he hated them, teachers weren't supposed to hate any of their students) and was thrilled whenever they went to their math and science lessons with Inukashi, who was infamous for his notoriously short temper and intolerance for stupidity.

Nezumi leaned back in his desk chair and gazed out the window as his class worked on a translation paper, the room silent and flooded with the early spring light. It was boring.

* * *

Shion wasn't sure what he thought about high school; he didn't know anyone except for his best friend, Safu. Luckily, the two of them were put in the same class, and Shion heard that that meant they would probably be in the same class for the rest of high school. But Shion was disappointed by the fact that there were very limited science classes to take, since he was mainly interested in and was planning on pursuing a career in Ecology. He and Safu knew each other from the advanced placement classes in junior high school, but this school didn't offer any of the classes the two of them dreamed of taking. Shion was smart; he was a modest boy, but he knew and would admit to that. He couldn't really speak without people realizing that as well, with his articulate phrasing and outstanding vocabulary that no one could seem to understand except for Safu and his teachers. Shion sometimes tried to talk like the rest of the students, but he just couldn't; he felt like it was boring and overdone. Shion hated boring things, and he also hated simple things. He figured he was mostly disappointed by high school because nothing exciting happened, and Shion hated when things were monotonous.

"Shion?"

Safu's voice broke him away from his train of thought, and he turned to look at her. She was looking at him with a slightly concerned expression (only slightly concerned, because she was convinced that the most brilliant people shouldn't show their emotions so easily). The two of them were sitting on the roof for lunch, and her short brown hair blew in the wind and caressed her cheeks. Shion would admit she was beautiful, but he wasn't even slightly attracted to her, despite what everyone always said in junior high school. "I'm sorry, what was it you said?"

"I said," Safu said, slightly irritated that Shion had stopped listening. "Why don't we study at my house tonight? Isn't your mom working?"

"Safu, it's the first day," Shion said, not really surprised by her enthusiasm. "We wont have anything to even study yet."

"We got our text books, didn't we?" Safu replied, hardly missing a beat. That answer was so entirely Safu that Shion grinned and pressed his lips together to keep himself from laughing; to Safu, an evening without memorization, without an extension of vocabulary or an examination of percentages, was an evening wasted.

"Why don't we take a night off, Safu?" Shion suggested. He leaned back on his hands and looked up at the sky; the traces of winter that hadn't faded away yet, like the cool breeze and the dark tint to the clouds and the pale color blue that painted the sky, brushed against in cheeks and he smiled at Safu. "It's the first day. Don't you think that's overwhelming enough?"

"No," Safu said immediately, pursing her lips in disapproval. "You've gone soft, Shion. It's important that we study as much as we can."

"There's a difference between diligence and obsession, Safu," Shion told her, closing his eyes as another soft, late winter breeze brushed against his face. He smiled and then looked at Safu, her short brown hair flowing gently with the wind. "It's important to enjoy yourself, too."  
"I could hardly call that important," Safu murmured as she looked away sheepishly, a light pink blush dusting her cheeks at the sight of Shion, so happy and so peaceful with the wind in his hair. "What's important is trying your very best to be the very best[1], and not resting until you meet all criteria."

"I think you've already far surpassed any 'criteria'," Shion said with a grin, laughing. "You try so hard."

Safu fell silent, and the two of them looked up at the passing clouds; below them, they could hear the shouts and muted chatter of their fellow high school students, gushing about the people in their classes and how different high school was from junior high and wondering how early they should start studying for exams. It was so natural and so easy that Shion couldn't help but frown to himself; was high school really going to be so simple? Surely there would have to be some kind of obstacle. He hated when things were so easy that he didn't even have to try. Sometimes he hated being smart, because he wondered how it felt to feel stressed before an exam, to stay up all night studying with friends and then sigh with audible relief the moment the bells rang at the end. If high school was going to be as easy as junior high, then why should he even bother?

The bell rang, breaking Shion from his reverie and signalling the end of lunch. Safu sighed and stood up, brushing off her skirt and looking down at Shion will her hands on her hips. She grinned and held out a hand to him, "Ready for round two?"

"Fight," Shion said halfheartedly, taking her hand though he hardly needed the support. He shoved his hands in his pockets as he followed Safu to the door that lead down to the classrooms.

Once they reached the stairway, he turned around and looked at the sky once more. He felt the breeze on his face again, and this time he smiled. Surely, that wind came from someplace he'd never been before. Every wind was different. Maybe this year would be different, too.

"Something interesting will definitely happen this year," Shion said softly to himself, smiling.

"Oi, Shion! Are you coming?" Safu called from the staircase. Shion gave the sky one last look before running after her.

* * *

"Tell me, how many days until summer break again?" Nezumi asked Inukashi, as the two of them leaned against the doorway to Nezumi's classroom, watching the students leave for the day. It was loud and irritating, in Nezumi's opinion; there were lost students and overconfident ones and ones that felt the need to yell greetings to everyone they know in the hallway. There were very few students that didn't annoy Nezumi, apart from his own. For example; there were two students just standing at the lockers (lockers that couldn't possibly be theirs because this was the upperclassmen hallway) waiting for an opportunity to escape through the doorway, a girl with short brown hair and a boy with bright, white hair. Nezumi assumed that he was a new, first year student; that bright hair would be enough to grab anyone's attention, so there was no way Nezumi would not have noticed him from years past. Nezumi found himself watching those two students for some reason, the way that the boy laughed and the girl had a stern expression on her face before breaking into a small smile.

"Far too many," Inukashi said with a grin, replying to Nezumi's earlier question. They both sighed in unison, watching as the hallway slowly cleared out, the thick concentration of students slowly thinning until there were only a select few staying behind for clubs or questions for teachers. "Why did we become teachers again?"

"Wish I knew," Nezumi replied. He had only been out of high school for five years, after graduating early and finishing college, before returning to his hometown and looking at his old high school and suddenly feeling the impulse, the desire to stay here. He couldn't explain it; he was young and he was brilliant, he could have done pretty much anything he wanted. But he had settled for a dull job with low pay simple for the sake of nostalgia. "Wish I knew."

* * *

"And I also heard that there are these two upperclassmen teachers who're the homeroom teachers for rooms 3A and 3B who are seriously strict," Safu said, taking a sip of the tea that Shion had just prepared. She set the cup down on the table gently and sighed, shaking her head. "I kind of wish we had gotten more strict teachers like them, not the happy-go-lucky lazy teachers we've gotten."

"I didn't think they were that bad," Shion admitted, his elbow on the table and his chin resting in his hand as he gazed out the window. "What's wrong with having kind teachers?"

"Kindness and laziness are not the same thing," Safu replied. She sighed again and leaned back on her hands, looking up at the ceiling. "Like you. You're both kind and serious. Isn't that fine? You'd be a good teacher."

"I don't know if I'd want to be a teacher," Shion said with a smile, but then tilted his head in consideration. "Maybe for younger students. Definitely not high school students."

"Definitely not," Safu agreed, laughing. "But I mean it, if I didn't consider it a waste of both your intelligence and kindness, I'd say being a teacher would be a perfect career choice for you."

"You have to be intelligent to be a teacher," Shion pointed out. Safu rolled her eyes.

"Not that intelligent," Safu replied. "I mean, remember our grade school teachers? They were hardly intelligent at all."

"Now that's not fair. It's not as though they can teach or act like college professors when you're dealing with younger kids," Shion protested, sitting up straighter and grinning. "But how about Rikiga-sensei? Do you remember him?"

"You mean that sorry excuse for an arts teacher we had back in junior high?" Safu said, grinning. "Now he really wasn't suited for teaching at all. He just played movies the whole time and swooned over the actresses."

"And sometimes the actors."

"Sometimes," Safu laughed. Shion grinned and looked out the window again, not noticing how Safu stared at him as he did so. She pursed her lips together and looked out the window as well. "You know, Shion... This year, I want to do something."

"Do something?" Shion repeated, tearing his gaze away from the window to give her a questioning look. Safu kept her eyes locked on the transparent glass and nodded. "Such as?"

"I'm not sure. I just... I want to do something," Safu said, just as vague but equally determined. "Something important, something I'll remember. Now that we're in high school."

"I see," Shion replied, smiling to himself as he looked out the window again. "I think I'd like to do something, too."

* * *

**Authors Note:**

****[1] = You have NO idea how hard it was not to type "The very best like no one ever was!" ... Maybe I like Pokemon too much.

But yeah! Here's yet ANOTHER No.6 story for you all. I've had this one in my mind for a while, and I've thought out the storyline a lot, as well as the details, and in that way it's a lot like my Vocaloid story 'Afraid of Being Lonely'. At least, I think that's what it's called. Is it bad that I can't really remember? Buuuuuut anyways. Here you go. 3


	2. Chapter 2

Two weeks later, Nezumi still wasn't happy about getting up in the mornings. The alarm was just as loud and the silence afterwards was just as suffocating. The world outside the window was a little brighter, though, and as the morning wore on eventually birds would sing gently outside his window. Nezumi still hated the mornings, though; he was mentally counting down the days until summer break. Seriously, why did he become a teacher again? Sometimes he couldn't remember. Well, whatever the reason was, surely it wasn't worth the groggy mornings and the headaches in the afternoon.

In the middle of his brooding, as he turned the corner to the hallway where his classroom was located, Nezumi collided with a passing student. He stumbled backwards a few steps and rubbed his shoulder where the head of the student collided with him. He turned to glare at whoever the clumsy student was, but then saw the boy with white hair bend down to pick up papers that had fallen out of his hands.

"A-Ah! I'm so sorry, sensei, I should really pay more attention! I'm so sorry!" The boy said quickly, an embarrassed blush flooding his cheeks as he tried to get all of his papers, which were scattered around him. Nezumi's expression softened and he bent down to help him. "It's fine, sensei, I can get these myself-"

"It's half my fault, so I should get half of them," Nezumi said offhandedly, glancing at the title of the paper he picked up. "Oh, a first year. That would explain your lost expression."

"I'm not lost," The white haired boy sniffed, straightening the papers in his hands and placing them carefully back into his bag. "I just sort of turned the wrong way, and then I turned the wrong way again, and then turned the way I thought was the right way and turned out not to be right after all and... " He trailed off and scratched his head, grinning sheepishly. "I guess I am lost." Nezumi pressed his lips together to keep himself from laughing.

"You're a first year, so you're on the first floor," Nezumi said, raising an eyebrow. Shouldn't that be obvious?

"Oh, right," He said, blinking his eyes in surprise and then nodding in understanding. "I wonder why I'm on the second floor."

* * *

"I swear, they teach us like we're children in this school, Shion," Safu huffed as they sat on the roof again for lunch. It had become a usual thing, in those first two weeks of school. Despite Safu's perfect grades and perfect attendance record, she was really quite fond of breaking school rules and policies. She was perfectly okay with picking the lock on the doorway to the stairwell leading to the roof, and then coming back every day afterwards. Shion was perfectly fine with it, he just found it ironic. "We're studying DNA. We did that in, what, elementary school?"

"You and I studied DNA in elementary school, Safu," Shion reminded her, taking a bite of the curry flavored bread he had managed to buy in the cafeteria. "You have to remember that we were in advanced placement classes for the majority of our educational careers so far. But they don't have classes like that here."

"They should," Safu said, pouting childishly. It was so unlike her character that Shion had to press his lips together and look away to keep himself from laughing. The serious and scholarly Safu wouldn't appreciate a comment like that. "It doesn't matter how small this school is. Or how ridiculously unintelligent the majority of this school is. As long as there is at least one student of above average intelligence they should offer advanced classes."

"You could... write a letter or something," Shion said, finishing off his bread and laying back on the roof, staring up at the clouds. In all honesty, Shion didn't really care about advanced classes or standard classes or whatever classes they decided to put him in. It didn't make a difference to him. "To like, the principal or someone."

"Your use of vocabulary astounds me sometimes, Shion," Safu said in a bemused way, before sighing and laying down next to him. She folded her hands on her stomach and turned her head to look at him. "We've always been together, haven't we?"

"We have," Shion replied, turning his head and smiling at her in return. His eyes closed with his smile so he didn't see the blush spread across her cheeks. "It's good, isn't it?"

"Yeah... I'm glad for it."

* * *

"... And then I woke up," Inukashi said solemnly, nodding slowly. "Scary, isn't it?"

"... I'm sorry, what?" Nezumi said, snapping out of his train of thought and glancing at his friend. "I stopped listening after a few seconds. Am I right in assuming you were talking about dogs or something?"

"Prick," Inukashi growled. "... And yeah, dogs."

"So I didn't even need to listen."

"It's polite to!"

"Since when have I ever been polite?"

"Even asses like you need to follow social protocol and shit."

"Since when?"

"Since fucking ALWAYS."

Just as Nezumi was about to respond, a timid voice behind him interrupted him. "Um... Excuse me?"

Inukashi and Nezumi turned to see the boy Nezumi had run into that morning, the first year with white hair and a horrible sense of direction. He was titling his head in inquisition, a bright smile on his face. Was this kid always happy? "Sensei, I was wondering if you could tell me where the library is."

"Which sensei?" Inukashi asked with a grin, clearly excited to tease a first year. Nezumi rolled his eyes and elbowed Inukashi hard in the side, ignoring his friend's yelp of pain and hushed string of curse words. "Damn it, Nezumi!"

"You're two weeks into the semester and you haven't been to the library yet?" Nezumi asked him, raising an eyebrow. "You really are hopeless, aren't you?"

"I haven't had the need to," The boy said defensively, puffing out his cheeks indignantly. The sight was so childlike that Nezumi smirked and tried not to laugh. Who was this kid? "I am not hopeless!"

"Whatever you say, first year," Nezumi said. "The library is on the first floor, at the very end of the south hallway."

"Ah, I see! Thank you very much!" The boy said happily. He bowed to both of them and smiled his bright smile once more before walking away, a light spring in his step.

"What an enthusiastic kid," Inukashi said, watching him bound away. "How do you know a first year?"

"We ran into each other this morning. Rather literally," Nezumi said. "He's kind of air-headed. I wonder how he made it to high school unscathed."

"His hair is insane," Inukashi said, standing on his toes in the hopes of seeing the head of white head among the crowd of students leaving for the day. "That can't be natural, can it?"

"It certainly is, though it's uncommon," Nezumi said, yawning. "That would explain the red eyes, too. Although I doubt you noticed."

"I did too notice!"

"Really?"

"...No..."

"Dumb ass," Nezumi sighed, leaning against the wall and smirking at Inukashi as he protested. Nezumi wouldn't admit how he was staring at those red eyes the entire conversation and found them so fascinating.

* * *

"Mmm... " Shion hummed to himself, standing on his toes to see the books that lined the higher shelves. The library was rather small, but that suited Shion just fine. It wasn't as though he was an avid reader. Safu had just mentioned in passing how their school had a surprisingly wide range of old English literature and Shion was curious. He had the fleeting memory of his mother reading to him as a child, a book titled _The Happy Prince_. Since Safu mentioned it, he couldn't seem to get it out of his mind. Certainly his mother didn't have the book anymore, so he wanted to find it for himself. He ignored the part of him that told him clinging to insignificant memories was childish, and continued searching. "I can't remember who the author is..."

He placed his finger on the spine of the book directly in front of him; a dark brown, hard cover copy of a play called _Hamlet_ by Shakespeare. Of course the name Shakespeare was familiar to Shion; Shakespeare was regarded as a genius in those well acquainted with theater and literature. Shion, not being one of those people, wasn't familiar with the title "Hamlet" at all, and wasn't really curious. He read all of the titles displayed in front of him; _Macbeth, Hamlet, Romeo and Juliet, Much Ado About Nothing_... Were those names meant to be significant to him?

"Macbeth..." Shion read out loud to himself. "A tragedy, is it?"

His eyes scanned the books around him and he took slow, measured steps as he searched for the book he had set out to find. He saw so many more unfamiliar titles, and authors he didn't recognize. What had made these stories so incredible that they had survived so many generations and traveled through so many countries? He had to admit to himself that it was incredible, and that he would like to try to read them sometime. But he was hopeless at reading things like English literature; those monologues and soliloquies and metaphors that went right over Shion's head were difficult for him to understand and comprehend. It was beautiful, though. The way that Shakespeare could make himself figuratively immortal through the use of words and stages impressed Shion.

"Oh!"

Shion saw, as he stood on his toes, the very bottom of the book. He saw the peeling golden letters, painted in elegant script, _The Happy Prince_. The author of this book was "Oscar Wilde", apparently. Well, it didn't really matter to him at all, he just wanted the book. However, he couldn't quite reach it; he stood on his toes and stretch his arm out as far as he could but he fingers just barely scraped the top of the book. It was so tightly crammed between the two books on either side of it that it was impossible for him to pull it out. Shion bit his lip in concentration and stretched more, trying to grab hold of the book.

As Shion stood on his toes once more to try to get to the book, a pale, slender hand grabbed it before Shion could even touch the spine of it; it was pulled from where it was lodged between the others and pulled out of view. Shion turned around and saw the teacher he had seen twice that day, the one that called him hopeless and had shockingly silver eyes, holding the book and smirking. "A-Ah, sensei!"

"Look who it is again," The teacher said, handing the book to him. "You're still here? Lessons let out an hour ago."

"It took me a while to find this book, I had forgotten who the author was," Shion said, smiling in gratitude and taking the fragile, aging book in his hands. He held it protectively against his chest. "Thank you very much, sensei."

"You're welcome, hopeless first year," He said, reaching around Shion to grab a book to his left.

"I'm not hopeless! And that's not my name. It's Shion," Shion said defensively, pouting.

"And I'm Nezumi, but to you I'll always be 'Sensei', and to me you'll always be 'that air-headed first year'."

"Unfair!" Shion whined, and Nezumi couldn't hold back his laughter this time. Nezumi took the book from Shion again and examined it more closely.

"Are you sure you want this copy? It's the simplified version," Nezumi told him, holding the book up and raising an eyebrow. "It's not the way it was written."

"Eh? Really?" Shion sighed, hanging his head. "And it took me so long to find it, too."

Nezumi tilted his head and placed "The Happy Prince" back where it belonged on the bookshelf. "I have a copy of it in my classroom, if you'd like it?"

"Really?" Shion asked, brightening up immediately. He smiled widely. "Thank you!"

* * *

Nezumi lead Shion up the stairs and listened to his mindless chatter; he didn't really mind it, but he was unused to the noise. The only people he really talked to were his students and Inukashi, so Shion's innocent and thoughtless, bubbly comments on everything and anything were unfamiliar but interesting to him. Shion talked about how he remembered his mother reading to him, and that was why he wanted to get _The Happy Prince_ in the first place, but he was having a really hard time finding it and got a little distracted by all of the other books, especially Shakespeare. Shakespeare sure did right a lot of plays, didn't he? A lot of them were tragedies; Shion wondered what happened to Shakespeare that made him so sad as to write volume after volume of tragedies. Nezumi had to admit to himself that he had never considered it, but he also didn't consider it very important. Still, though, it was interesting to hear Shion's point of view.

"Upperclassmen rooms are so much bigger," Shion said in awe as the two of them walked inside Nezumi's classroom. Nezumi rolled his eyes and closed the door behind them.

"Hardly," Nezumi said, crossing the room to where his supply closet was. He glanced behind him and saw Shion staring out the window, a wide smile on his face. "It's just a bit higher up."

"It's brilliant," Shion said, turning and smiling at Nezumi again. Nezumi wondered why he smiled so much. Was there really so much to smile about?

"Anyway, it's back here," Nezumi called as he walked into the closet. He heard Shion follow close behind him and flip the light on; the contents of the supply room were thrown into sharp relief. There were countless dusty, aging volumes of books. Shion could smell the yellowing pages, that distinct scent of old books. Shion wandered into the closet and gazed at all of them. "It should be around here..."

"_Romeo and Juliet_," Shion read out loud, touching the spine of the book with his finger, the golden script sparkling against the brown cover. "This one is a tragedy, too?"

"You've never read it?" Nezumi asked, slightly surprised. "That one's a classic. Well, they're all classics, but still."

"I've heard of it before, but I don't know anything about it," Shion said, pulling the book from it's place and examining the cover. "Isn't it about two people who can't be together or something like that?"

"What an eloquent way to put it," Nezumi murmured, rolling his eyes. He lightly tapped the top of Shion's head with the book in his hand and recited:

"_From forth the fatal loins of these two foes, _  
_A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life; _  
_Whose misadventur'd piteous overthrows,_  
_Doth with their death bury their parents' strife_."

"Amazing!" Shion said in awe, his eyes wide. "That's from the play? I'd never heard that before! You memorized that? Have you memorized a lot of it? How about the other plays? Have you memorized those, too? Is it just Shakespeare that you like?"

"Yes, yes, yes, that's an awfully vague way to put it, mostly, and no," Nezumi said. "You're inquisitive."

"Too much so for my own good, Safu tells me," Shion pouted. "Isn't being curious a good thing?"

"Curiosity killed the cat," Nezumi quoted, grinning when Shion stuck his tongue out at him. "You know that one, don't you?"

"Of course I do!" Shion muttered, crossing his arms. Nezumi just laughed and pulled another book of the shelf. He handed it to Shion who took it happily, looking at the cover. "_The Happy Prince_..."

"That's the one you wanted, isn't it?"

"Yes!" Shion smiled happily again. "Thank you, sensei!"

"No problem, hopeless first year."

"I told you! It's Shion! S-H-I-O-N!"

"... Shion."


	3. Chapter 3

"Shion, you're reading another one of those books?"

Shion looked up from his copy of _Hamlet _to meet Safu's disapproving gaze. He nodded and smiled, holding up the book so she could examine the cover. She clicked her tongue in disapproval. "Why are you wasting your time with things like literature, Shion? You know we have a test on the basic structure of DNA tomorrow."

"You said yourself that we've known that for years," Shion said, turning his attention back to his book. He decided he particularly enjoyed this one; he liked Ophelia, and he also rather liked Hamlet. He knew this book was a tragedy, so things surely wouldn't end well for Hamlet, but it interested him all the same.

He had finished _The Happy Prince_ in one night; he neglected studying (He didn't really need it, anyway.)and read it well into the night. Not simply for the sake of nostalgia, but he enjoyed the way the words seemed to blend and melt together, almost like a song. Of course he couldn't fully understand and comprehend it the way it was meant to be read, old English literature was like a foreign language to those unfamiliar with it, but he really enjoyed it. He had visited Nezumi-sensei's classroom the next day after lessons to ask him to clarify and define a few things, and he had given Shion a copy of _Hamlet_, saying "This one is my favorite." Shion was determined to finish it and see why it was his favorite. Was it Ophelia? Maybe it was the monologues. The entire tone to _Hamlet_, too, was different than that of _The Happy Prince_. While it was sad, it had a sarcastic and skeptical, resigned acceptance of the fact that things would end badly. At least, that's what Shion got from it. He would ask Nezumi-sensei about it later.

"I didn't think you liked things like that, Shion."

"I neither liked nor disliked them until a few days ago," Shion replied. "When you mentioned that our school had a lot of books like these, I decided to look for a book my mother had read to me when I was younger."

"I hadn't said that because I approved of it," Safu said, crossing her arms and frowning. "Lunch break is almost over, Shion, and you haven't eaten anything."

"I'm not hungry," Shion said, distracted. He frowned and peered at the pages. "I wonder what that means...?"

Safu sighed and went back to her seat on the other side of the classroom. She opened her textbook and glanced over at Shion, who turned the page of the book, smiling to himself.

* * *

"Sensei?"

Nezumi turned from the chalkboard to see Shion hesitating in the doorway. Nezumi resumed erasing the board. "Come on in."

"Why is Hamlet your favorite?" Shion asked, closing the door behind him and walking over to a desk, sitting on top of it and frowning. "I think it's sad."

"Just because it's sad, that doesn't mean it's not brilliant." Nezumi informed him, turning around to look at Shion. "What, you liked _The Happy Prince_ more?"

"Well, I guess not," Shion muttered, looking down at 'Hamlet' and brushing his fingers against the cover. He looked up at Nezumi earnestly. "But still. I really liked Hamlet."

"That's why it's my favorite," Nezumi said, turning back towards the chalkboard. "It's so rare that I wholly like a character, faults included, that I feel sympathy for him by the end. I felt that way about Hamlet, so it's my favorite."

"I see," Shion said, tilting his head. He hopped off the desk and bounded towards the supply closet that was more like a library. "I'm going to put this back~"

"All right," Nezumi replied, putting the eraser down. He saw Shion disappear into the closet and stared at the doorway, thinking to himself; it was surprising enough that Shion could comprehend The Happy Prince, let alone actually enjoy it and keep borrowing more books. Not that it upset Nezumi, it actually made him happy that to see someone else enjoy the things he enjoyed most. "Try _Othello_ next."

"_Othello_?" Shion's voice called from among the books, and Nezumi smiled to himself. "Okay, but can I come again tomorrow? I doubt I'll understand it. Oh! I have a few questions about _Hamlet_, too."

Nezumi's smile grew more gentle, and he walked in the direction of Shion's voice. "Sure."

* * *

For days after that, days that stretched into weeks, Shion would stop by Nezumi's classroom after lessons ended to ask him about a certain monologue or character, or to complain about another sad ending to another sad story. Nezumi found that he kept giving more and more books to Shion, and Shion kept coming back. Nezumi also found that he didn't really mind; he certainly wasn't used to having someone sit in his classroom as he graded papers or planned lessons, and he was even more unfamiliar with Shion's chatter or that he actually wanted Nezumi's opinion on things, but he didn't dislike it. In fact, Nezumi rather enjoyed Shion's company. He didn't understand why, seeing as he could hardly stand Inukashi's company and they had been friends for as long as Nezumi could remember, but Shion's bright and innocent smile, his constant stream of questions and his air-headed hopelessness... Nezumi found all of those things endearing.

"Don't I bother you, sensei?" Shion had asked randomly one afternoon, looking up from a copy of _Much Ado About Nothing_, frowning slightly.

"Hmm?" Nezumi looked up from the essay he was grading, meeting Shion's worried gaze. "Not really."

"I thought I asked too many questions," Shion murmured, holding up his book so it covered the bottom half of his face, wearing a sheepish expression. "It's fine if you say so, I just think this is interesting."

"This?"

"I really like these books," Shion said, putting the book down and smiling. "I don't really understand them all that well, and it takes me a long time to read them, but I really like... I guess the way Shakespeare says things? The way he puts words together."

"Your language is as eloquent as ever, Shion," Nezumi said, smirking. "But yeah, I get what you mean."

"Really?" Shion said brightly, smiling.

"Yeah, I've gotten used to the childish way you talk," Nezumi replied, laughing when Shion protested loudly. He straightened the stack of papers that he had just finished grading and placed them on his desk, standing up and stretching. "But if you start grading papers for me, then I wont mind if you stay."

"I don't want to do that, I have my own homework to do," Shion whined childishly, pouting. Nezumi tilted his head and considered Shion. "What?"

"I-"

"Nezumi!"

Both Nezumi and Shion turned as the door to Nezumi's classroom burst open, revealing an irritated Inukashi. Inukashi blinked in surprise and straightened up the moment he saw Shion, staring at him in shock. Inukashi cleared his throat, pressing his fist to his lips and said to Nezumi in a dignified voice, "Ah, I wasn't aware that you were preoccupied, sensei. Allow me to-"

"You're not fooling anyone, Inukashi." Nezumi said monotonously. "What do you want?"

Inukashi grumbled and blew at a strand of his long brown hair that had fallen out of his ponytail. He tucked the hair behind his ear and put a hand on his waist, pushing his glasses further up the bridge of his nose. "I need a ride home."

"What? Why?" Nezumi asked, his voice and eyes revealing slight surprise. "What about your motorcycle?"

"Wont start," Inukashi grumbled, walking over to Nezumi's desk and collapsing in his chair, spinning around in place before propping his feet up on Nezumi's desk.

"Watch the papers," Nezumi sighed, pinching the bridge of his nose in agitation. He glanced over at Shion, who was tilting his head and watching Inukashi in slight curiosity. Nezumi pressed his lips together to keep himself from laughing at the thought of what sort of analysis was going through Shion's head at the moment.

"U-Um! Sensei!" Shion said suddenly, holding up a hand and leaning towards Inukashi, holding Hamlet to his chest and wearing a determined expression. "Do you like Shakespeare?"

It was silent for a few moments, and Nezumi looked from Inukashi to Shion and back again, a small smile on his lips. He supposed Inukashi wasn't used to Shion's... eccentricity. Or curiosity, for that matter. When he considered it, he thought that Inukashi's personality couldn't be more different than Shion's.

Inukashi blinked in surprise before answering the question, staring at Shion with a strange expression on his face. "N... Not particularly..."

"Oh. That's boring," Shion pouted. "Do you like dogs?"

"What's with that sudden question?" Inukashi asked in confusion.

"Well, your name. It means 'Dog Keeper', right?" Shion asked, titling his head. Inukashi laughed loudly, leaning back in the chair.

"Yeah, I like dogs, but I'd like them regardless of my name," Inukashi snickered. He glanced at Nezumi, grinning. "You're keeping such an air-headed person around, Nezumi."

"Why do people say that?" Shion said, puffing his cheeks out indignantly. "I have to go, sensei. I'll see you tomorrow!"

"See you," Nezumi said, subconsciously holding up a hand in farewell as Shion left the classroom. Without realizing it, Nezumi watched him disappeared and stared at the doorway for moment after Shion closed it.

"Geez, Nezumi, I thought you hated kids," Inukashi said, covering his mouth and yawning before lacing his fingers behind his head, looking out the window. "Why're you keeping him around?"

"What are you talking about?" Nezumi asked, pushing Inukashi's legs off his desk and gathering his papers and things, placing them in his brief case.

"I mean you can tell him to fuck off if he's bothering you," Inukashi said. "Someone as clueless as him... He's got to be pissing you off."

"Well, he asks too many questions and has the language capabilities of a child, but I don't mind him," Nezumi said indifferently. He met Inukashi's incredulous gaze and closed his brief case, pursing his lips defensively. "What?"

"That's very... un-Nezumi."

"Un-Nezumi?"

"Mm hm. You hate most people," Inukashi explained. "Especially teenagers. And people who ask too many questions."

"So?"

"That kid's a person. And he's a teenager. AND he asks too many questions. Not to mention he seems completely air-headed, and he's a complete natural, and-"

"Shion," Nezumi interrupted. When Inukashi raised his eyebrows in a questioning way, Nezumi elaborated, "His name is Shion."

Inukashi shook his head in wonder, yawning again. "Well, whatever. Just take me home."

* * *

Shion was impatiently awaiting the bell that signaled the end of lessons. He was one of the first to finish their exam, just a few seconds slower than Safu, who had checked and then double checked and then triple checked all of her answers and then didn't change any of them because that was just part of her stubborn and confident nature. Shion folded his arms on the desk, resting his chin on his folded arms and looking out the window. Spring was more prominently upon them at that point; sakura blossoms lazily flew in and out of the view of the window, the gentle spring breeze playing with them in an almost childish kind of way before setting them on the ground softly among hundreds of others. Shion rather liked spring, because he was very fond of the beginnings of things, and he liked the baby blue sky that accompanied it's arrival and the fluffy white clouds that dotted the sky here and there.

But he didn't want to watch the sky, he wanted it to be time for lunch. He wanted to read more of Macbeth, even though he didn't care for it much. He disliked Macbeth, and his selfish and power-hungry nature, and he also disliked Lady Macbeth, who was stubborn and even more ambitious than her husband. He had liked Duncan, but Duncan had been murdered, so he was already subconsciously hating the book for a number of reasons. He snapped out of his thought process as the bell rang, and he immediately dove into his bag. As he pulled out the book, though, someone's small and slender hand pulled it from his grasp. He looked up to see Safu standing over him, holding the book up next to her head with a frown on her face.

"Eat lunch with me today, Shion. It's been weeks," Safu said, tilting her head. "I promise I wont make you study with me."

"All right, Safu," Shion said with a smile. He did miss her company, he was just preoccupied with his recently acquired obsession. He wasn't sure exactly what he liked more; the flow of the words, or Nezumi-sensei's approving smile that accompanied them. "The roof again, I assume?"

"Always," Safu said, a small and victorious smile on her face. Shion followed her out of the room, his hands in his pockets. "You've been spending so much time reading lately, Shion. Haven't you been studying at all."

"I've been studying!" Shion said defensively. It wasn't a lie; Shion studied when he got home. Just not nearly as much as he had in the past. "You don't need to mother me, Safu."

"I'm being more of a friend than a mother," Safu said. The two of them walked up the stairs leading to the roof; their steps on the metallic stairs echoed around them, bouncing off the stone walls that magnified and intensified each sound, including Safu's voice. "But I am being serious. We've hardly studied together since the first few weeks of school." Safu bit her lip to keep herself from saying, 'You've hardly paid attention to me', but Shion didn't see her expression.

"We don't need to study."

"Someone's getting a little over-confident, aren't they?"

"Coming from you, I wont take those words seriously," Shion said, grinning as Safu lead them both onto the room. It was much warmer than the last time Shion had set foot on the roof, and Safu rushed ahead of him, spinning around once and throwing her arms out, smiling.

"Isn't it nice, Shion?"

"Yeah," Shion said, smiling in response to Safu's euphoric expression, "It's nice."

* * *

"Oi, Nezumi."

"What?"

"Sing that one song."

Nezumi and Inukashi were sitting in Inukashi's classroom during lunch, while their classes were off somewhere in the school. Upperclassmen rarely stayed in their classrooms during lunch, thankfully to Nezumi and Inukashi. Inukashi was sitting on the desks of one of his students, and Nezumi was sitting cross-legged on the floor in front of it, a book in his hands. Nezumi bent his head back to look up at Inukashi, raising an eyebrow. "That one song?"

"Yeah. The one about souls and shit."

"How very specific. Regardless of which song you are requesting, I respectively decline."

"Awwwww but Nezumiiii," Inukashi whined. "I've had a bad day."

"It's hardly half-way into the day," Nezumi sighed, turning the page of his book. "What could possibly make your day so bad already?"

"Well first of all, I overslept," Inukashi began. "And I had to walk the dogs really quick, but they take for-fucking-EVER. And then on the way here, my motorcycle's engine blew again. So I had to walk the rest of the way and I was almost late! Oh, by the way, you have to drive me home again."

"No way," Nezumi said, still paying most of his attention to the book in his hands rather than his lamenting friend. "Your place is so out of the way."

"But Neeeeeezuuuuuuumiiiiiiiiiii!"

"Shut up."

"Oh, guess what I saw today?" Inukashi said in a sing-song voice, like a child who knew a secret. "It's a seeeecret~"

"I'm simply bursting with curiosity."

"Okay, I'll tell you, since you want to know so badly," Inukashi said. "I saw that kid you're babysitting these days-"

"Shion."

"Yeah, him. I saw him go up on the roof with some girl," Inukashi snickered, grinning. "Looks like your little toy has a girlfriend."

"He's not my toy," Nezumi sighed, closing his book. "And what does it matter to me if he has a girlfriend?"

"Well, you know. Now you can't seduce him with your always charming social skills."

"You're a dumb ass," Nezumi informed him, and just as Inukashi opened his mouth angrily to make some retort, the bell rang.

"Yeah, whatever. Get the hell out of my classroom," Inukashi pouted. "I expected you to be angry."

"Sorry to disappoint you."

As his class began to silently work on their tests, Nezumi leaned back in his chair and gazed out the window. His window was too high to see the sakura blossoms, and that always upset it. He thought about what Inukashi said, and wondered why it bothered him. What did it matter to him if Shion had a girlfriend?

Nezumi sighed inaudibly to himself and closed his eyes. He didn't want to think about it.

* * *

"Sensei~"

Shion walked into Nezumi's classroom to find that Nezumi wasn't there. Shion frowned to himself but continue farther into the classroom. Shion assumed that Nezumi would probably return in a few minutes; he was usually in his classroom after lessons let out, so why would today be any different? If he took too long Shion would just leave. There was no harm in waiting.

Shion placed his bag on a desk and looked around the classroom, examining it more closely than he had in his previous visits. It was really a very simple and traditional classroom, like most of the others in the school, but for some reason Shion felt it didn't suit Nezumi very well. Shion sat down at a desk and pulled out Macbeth, opening it to the place where he left off. He started reading quietly to himself:

"_Life's but a walking shadow,_

_A poor player that struts_

_And frets his hour upon the stage_

_and then is heard no more_."

"Wow, I'm actually impressed by how flat that was."

Nezumi was leaning in the doorway, smirking. Shion pouted and closed the book. "I wasn't that bad!"

"You've clearly never read a play out loud before. A rat could recite that with more emotion than you just did," Nezumi continued to tease him, closing the door behind him and walking into the classroom. "Well I'm sorry to have kept you waiting. What do you need today?"

"Eh? What do I need?" Shion tilted his head. "Nothing, really."

"And you came here anyway?"

"Well... is that a problem?" Shion asked, suddenly feeling insecure.

"Not really, I just thought you'd be bored," Nezumi said, walking over to his desk and sitting down, pulling a few essays closer to him and inspecting the first of the pile. "I don't mind if you stay."

"Oh, that's a relief," Shion said. "I don't want to bother you."

"Quite the contrary," Nezumi said, still examining the essay before him. He underlined a misspelled word and frowned in disapproval at the essay. "Just figured you'd rather spend your time with your girlfriend or something."

"Girlfriend?" Shion repeated, sounding surprised.

"Mm. Inukashi said he saw you going up on the roof with some girl," Nezumi said, appearing as though he was hardly interested in the subject. He made another mark on the essay. "Which is a bad idea, you know. Students aren't allowed on the roof."

"Safu's not my girlfriend," Shion said immediately, his cheeks flushing slightly pink. "She's just my friend."

"Is that so?" Nezumi said. "Well, no matter who she is, you shouldn't sneak on the roof."

"It's not as though I didn't know that already," Shion pouted. "But it's nice on the roof."

"Detention's not as nice," Nezumi said, smirking. Shion sighed and pulled Macbeth out of his bag, and Nezumi raised an eyebrow. "At least finish your homework before you start reading, Shion. I feel like I'm making you fail."

"Awww, Seeenseeeeiii~"

"Don't whine, you're starting to sound like Inukashi."


	4. Chapter 4

Summer break came abruptly, almost silently, and it surprised everyone with it's sudden heat, it's typhoons and it's sense of freedom. Before anyone even knew it, the sakura petals were blown along in the wind and only found in the cracks of sidewalks and pressed against the concrete in the road. They were replaced by leaves of vibrant green, with flowers of white and red and yellow and blue and so many others because there are so many colors, and soon the air was alive with sound; birds singing louder than they did in the spring, cicadas and the laughter of children living their summer vacation's without worries about their homework or waking up early or going to bed on time, which would certainly come back to haunt them they day before the second term began.

The same was true for Shion's school; the students poured out of the school, all of them eagerly discussing plans for that day and so many days after. The air was warm and, in Shion's opinion, unpleasantly feverish. Safu was like most girls, excited for the break; but she was more excited for the time she could spend studying and researching than she was for shopping and days spent on the beach. Shion had mixed feelings, but he was mostly dreading the vacation.

"It's a break to you guys. But we still have to come in most days," Nezumi had sighed the last day of school before the break. "We have exams to grade and other papers and lessons to plan... What a great way to spend the summer..."

"I'd rather stay here," Shion had grumbled, pouting in the childish way that he always did. "We can switch places."

Shion thought that the way Nezumi ruffled his hair and laughed made up for the long, dreadful vacation ahead.

During the summer break, Shion was more than restless; he was _anxious_. He studied for the first few days, making up for the time in class he spent day dreaming or reading under his desk, or staring out the window and longing for the warm breezes outside. He read, reread, and then read his notes again, rewriting them and then highlighting and underlining and making little notes in the margins of the pages that he didn't really need but wrote in anyway. He didn't care for the lessons, he wasn't interested in them, but Safu kept pestering him to study more so that's what he was doing. But _still_...

"Shion, you're just used to school," Safu told him after Shion had confided his feelings to her. "You're always like this. You put your all into something and then you don't know what to do with yourself when your hands are empty. Just study more."

"I've been studying for the past three days," Shion had sighed.

He realized he missed the books. He had read so many of them, and slipped into so many other worlds that he forgot how to behave in his own world. Shion was the kind of person who, once he found something he liked, put his absolute all and his entire heart into it. So he longed for the feeling of the aging pages on his fingers, the smell of the fragile books, and he longed for Nezum-

He blinked and stared up at the ceiling of his bedroom; he had been laying on his bed and running through his inner monologue when Nezumi's name slipped into his train of thought and now wouldn't go away. He knew he rather liked his sensei (Who wasn't really_ his _sensei.) with whom he spent so many after school hours, but did he really miss him so much that he was sneaking into Shion's thoughts even when he wasn't in school?

Shion sat up and hugged his legs to his chest, resting his chin on his knees as he looked down at the blanket of his bed. He supposed, at this point, Nezumi was more of a friend than a sensei. Actually, Nezumi was never actually _his_ sensei in the first place. They met in a school, and Nezumi was a teacher and Shion was a student, but they never behaved as such. Shion nodded to himself as he thought these words. Yes, Nezumi was a friend, not a teacher to Shion. So of course it would be natural to miss a friend during summer break. Of course it was normal.

It was normal, right?

* * *

Halfway into summer break, Shion visited a book store.

He thought he would maybe try to survive summer without the books, occupy his time with the things he used to do in his free time, but he found he couldn't remember exactly what it was he enjoyed to do in the past. Besides, there was nothing wrong with picking up a new hobby. He picked out the titles he recognized from Nezumi's little personal library but had never read himself; plays like /Julius Ceaser/, and some of them were in English so Shion had no idea what they said. He wondered if Nezumi knew English, and if he knew English, did Nezumi know any other languages? He wondered so many things about Nezumi; Why did he want to be a teacher? How long _had_ he been a teacher? Where did he go to school? How long had he and Inukashi been friends? What we he interested in besides reading? Did he have a girlfriend?

" . . . "

Shion covered his face with the book he was holding, hiding his embarrassed blush that had flooded his cheeks. The most embarrassing thing about that question was that Shion _really did_ want to know. What would Nezumi said if he knew Shion was thinking about him like that? He'd probably laugh.

"I'm like a school girl," Shion muttered to himself, blushing even more furiously at the thought of it. He wouldn't admit it to himself, let alone say it out loud, that he was crushing on his teacher (That wasn't really his teacher.) in the middle of summer vacation, where school was supposed to be the _last_ thing on anyone's mind. That thought didn't stop him from buying every Shakespeare title he could remember Nezumi mentioning, though.

* * *

Developing a "crush", for lack of a better word, for a teacher seemed to be a rather difficult thing, Shion realized. Because it couldn't end the way that they did in most situations in high school; a letter on their desk or in their mailbox, and embarrassed meeting in the hallway or maybe out in public, and then dating publicly and happily if everything goes well. Shion understood that there was a very low chance of his feelings being reciprocated and, if they were any chance by some miracle, then being with Nezumi would be a very difficult and also dangerous thing.

"Stupid," Shion groaned and rolled over in his bed, burying his face in his pillow, hiding his blush. "Why..."

He couldn't explain it, but he was drawn to Nezumi [1] and the emotions he felt were... extreme, Shion supposed would be a good word. He wanted to impress Nezumi and make Nezumi laugh, he wanted to read the things Nezumi liked to read and be able to talk to him about them. He wondered if that counted as loving someone, wanting to be around them often and enjoying every moment they were together. Maybe Shion was just unused to being around someone who he could connect to on a slightly more personal level; with Safu, everything was about studies and percentages and facts, studying and planning for greater things in life. Shion didn't really like that, he wanted to to enjoy every moment of his life without worrying about the future. He was smart but he didn't care about it, and that infuriated Safu.

Shakespeare was something that Shion couldn't relate to, and often couldn't understand; it was a challenge for him and he loved it. He loved having to reread it, squint at certain words and ask Nezumi for guidance. He loved learning about it, and he loved when he could come to understand whole books without any assistance, although he lied and said he didn't understand so he could feel Nezumi lean down close to him and look at the phrase in question. He loved being new at something and learning about it. He wasn't used to it.

"I want break to end..."

* * *

Safu had, of course, forced Shion to study with him at least once a week during the break. She would exhaust everything they've learned in school and took things to extremes; memorization of things that hardly needed to be memorized, inventing her own seemingly impossible equations and then solving them in seconds, and becoming more and more adept to English, which Shion was still hopeless with. Over the summer he got better at it, though, and he decided that maybe it wasn't such a bad thing to study often. Though he still didn't want to study as much as Safu would like to.

Shion was never very good at forgetting Nezumi entirely, and he was brought up suddenly one day when he and Safu went out to lunch.

"That teacher is a bad influence on you," Safu said in a disapproving tone, taking a sip of her tea. "You're far less focused on your school work than you are with those books these days, Shion. They're hardly even interesting."

"_I _ think they're interesting," Shion mumbled self-consciously, taking a bite of cherry cake. "I really enjoy them, Safu. I'm glad that I was introduced to them."

"You've been interested in ecology for as long as I can remember. That was your desired career path. Don't you still want to be a scientist, Shion? A theoretical or even an applied professor at any university you wish. Don't you still want that?"

"Well, of course!" Shion defended. "It's not as though I've forgotten about everything else."

That was true enough in itself; Shion hadn't stopped studying, hadn't stopped getting perfect scores on tests and becoming the favorite of every teacher he encountered. He was still entirely set on becoming a scientist. That hadn't changed at all.

"Just be sure to remember where you priorities lie, Shion," Safu sighed in resignation of the subject. "I just don't want to see you get caught up in something new and interesting and forget what it is you've been working for all this time."

And she was right, of course; that's exactly what had been happening. He had come across an interesting person who introduced him to interesting things and he got so intrigued by both of them that he forgot about his own personality. Surely, Nezumi wouldn't dislike him just for caring about his studies towards ecology instead of reading a new play every other day. That's all Shion was worried about, really. The opinion of a stranger who was a little more of a friend than a stranger but still someone whom he didn't know very well.

"And you do this more often," Safu pointed out, pulling Shion away from the depths of his thoughts and smiling to herself, reaching across the table to tap Shion on the forehead. "You get lost in thought far more these days."

"I do not!"

"Don't try thinking too hard, Shion, you might hurt yourself."

"Safu!"

* * *

'I wonder what Nezumi is doing...'

* * *

Nezumi sighed and leaned back in his desk chair, glaring outside at the innocent, beautiful summer day as though it had said something incredibly insulting. Nezumi wanted to get out of the school, perhaps go to a book store or somewhere different or, quite frankly, anywhere but that damn school. Nezumi wouldn't go so far as to say that he hated small, closed spaces, because that was actually what he liked and preferred; his own apartment was rather cluttered and cramped, and that was exactly how he liked it. But in such a big school that was so empty, with no one but Inukashi to keep him company... he assumed that this was what hell was like. Maybe he should have prayed more as an adult, then maybe he wouldn't have to suffer like this.

"Oi, Nezumi, let's go out for lunch."

Nezumi looked up from his lesson plans and raised an eyebrow at Inukashi, who was leaning over Nezumi's desk and grinning. "Why?"

"Why? Because it's summer. And I'm getting really fucking sick of this place. And I want you to buy me things."

"Ah, there it is."

"Oh, come on!" Inukashi whined. "I'm so tired of being cooped up in here. I finished my lesson plans forever ago."

"No, you didn't. You never plan your lessons."

"Yeah, well, shut your mouth and buy me lunch."

And so, Inukashi grabbed Nezumi and pulled him out of the school with surprising strength that one wouldn't expect from the smaller man. This happened most days when they were inside the school, acting as supervision for the clubs that met during the summer and planning lessons.

And that was how Nezumi spent his summer.

* * *

Shion sighed and slumped over the desk in his bedroom, folding his arms on top of the desk and resting his chin on them. "I bet he's doing something really interesting..."

* * *

**Author's** Note:

[1]- I thought that maybe I was moving it too fast; like, I was making Shion love him too quickly. But then I decided I'd keep it as close to the story as I could, so, yeah. :P In the series, Shion's emotions for Nezumi were abrupt and extreme. Sooooooooooo. I'm keeping it like that.


	5. Chapter 5

At the sound of the loud, monotonous and blaring alarm, Nezumi's eyes opened slowly and groggily. However, instead of his usual ritual of slamming his fist down on that innocent piece of plastic, or the occasional occurrence of throwing it against the far wall and watching in satisfaction as it broke into several pieces, he turned it off quietly and without violence. He sat up slowly and ran his hand through the hair cascading down and brushing against his shoulders that was usually tied up. The sunlight leaked through the sections of the windows that weren't covered and illuminated tracks on the floor. Summer was warm, Nezumi thought to himself, and he liked the way that the birds sang. So maybe, after all, mornings weren't so bad.

It was the first day since summer break, so usually Nezumi would be in an unusually foul mood; but it was like he didn't mind anymore. Looking at the window and the warmth flooding from beneath the curtain, he found himself almost excited to get to school.

Nezumi wondered what it was that had changed about mornings since the spring, and he thought maybe it was the warmth. Maybe it was the birds, or maybe it was the sunlight. But he also thought it might be due to a certain white-haired, air-headed individual who smiled at him with genuine kindness at the end of every day. That might have been it, too, though Nezumi would never admit it to anyone beside himself. And certainly not to Shion.

'I have to admit, though,' Nezumi thought to himself, as he stared at his tired reflection in the bathroom mirror. 'Shion has a way of making things...'

Interesting? Nice? _Lovely_, even? Nezumi shook his head; Shakespeare would be ashamed of his word choice. So many adjectives he could chose and yet he couldn't think of a single one that could describe Shion in his entirety. Maybe Shion was just like that. Indescribable.

What was it about Shion that was so interesting, though? Nezumi asked this question in his thoughts during the day, while the students in his class were chatting quietly while they worked on a paper, staring out the window at the late summer day. Maybe it was his innocent enthusiasm and curiosity, maybe it was his determination. Maybe it was his genuine kindness. But Shion's impact on him was so sudden, so extreme, that it left him almost breathless. Why was that? Why was it that such an air-headed, innocent _kid_ took over his thoughts and made him so curious? He looked forward to the time he spent with Shion, even though he had to admit that he knew very, very little about him.

He hadn't seen Shion in so long. Had he kept reading? Maybe he lost interest in Shakespeare over the break. Nezumi frowned at his reflection at the thought of that; what if Shion stopped coming to his classroom, stopped reading those books that had been left on shelves to gather dust for the past few years? He supposed that teenagers were just like that; they found something new and it was interesting, then it grew dull and they became enticed by something else. Nezumi just hoped that that 'something else' was something he could provide for Shion; he enjoyed Shion's company. He couldn't really describe it. He was someone who hated being around people, who came off as cold and blunt and mean, and yet Shion wanted to be by him anyway. Maybe it was the Shakespeare that kept Shion around, or maybe it was him. Nezumi hoped for the latter.

"Oi, Nezumi."

Nezumi blinked and broke away from his reverie; Inukashi was standing in front of his desk, his arm crossed and a skeptical expression on his face. "What?"

"You've been staring out the window for, like, ever."

"Forever? You don't say."

"Whatever," Inukashi grumbled, sinking down on his knees and folding his arms on top of Nezumi's desk, resting his chin on his folded arms and glaring at Nezumi. "I'm bored, Nezumi."

"I'm teaching right now," Nezumi began, but when he looked up his classroom was empty. It was lunchtime, apparently. "Oh, never mind."

"Fuck, Nezumi, how long have you been out of it?" Inukashi shook his head in disbelief, before grinning. "What, did you meet someone over the break?"

"You're asking me if I've met someone? Because I'm such a social butterfly, right?" Nezumi replied sarcastically, raising an eyebrow. Inukashi just stuck his tongue out at him in response.

"Or maybe it's that hopeless-looking kid you've been babysitting," Inukashi teased further, smirking. Nezumi rolled his eyes. "Don't give me that look."

"I don't know how else to look at you."

"You're an ass."

Nezumi tuned out Inukashi's obscene stream of insults and pondered what it was that his friend had said; was it obvious that Nezumi cared for Shion? Did Nezumi even really care for Shion at all?

Shion wasn't even one of his students, and he'd only known him for a few months. Why did it matter to him if Shion stopped coming or not? He wasn't sure what it was he found so endearing; maybe his innocent curiosity, his determination, his genuine kindness. Nezumi had never met anyone quite like Shion; he told himself that he liked having Shion around so much because Shion was interesting, and for no other reason.

Nezumi wondered when it was that he became such a liar.

* * *

"Shion!"

At the sound of his name being called, Shion froze mid-step and turned to see Safu running towards him, waving a hand in the air and smiling enthusiastically. It was the end of the school day; lessons had just let out and every student had let out a breath of relief at the chiming of the dismissal bells. But the reason Shion was happy for the end of the day was because he could see Nezumi for the first time in what seemed like ages even though it was merely a few weeks. When Safu caught up to him, he turned around almost reluctantly. He liked Safu an awful lot, and she was his best friend, but at the moment the only person he truly wanted to see was on the third floor of the building, surrounded by aging literature and an air of sarcasm. "What's wrong, Safu?"

"I was just going to suggest that we walk home together today," Safu said in a slightly breathless voice, smiling and adjusting her bag on her shoulder. She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and titled her head, frowning slightly. "We haven't walked home together since the first few weeks of school."

"Oh, you're right," Shion said, and he suddenly felt tremendously guilty for the lack of attention he was giving to his best friend. "I'm sorry, Safu. I'm actually planning on going to see-"

"That teacher again, right?" Safu said quietly. She sighed and bit her lip, looking down at her feet. "He's not even your teacher, Shion. Why do you go see him so often?"

"Why?" Shion repeated her question, and pursed his lips as he pondered his answer; he searched for an answer that didn't seem selfish, one that Safu might be able to understand, but discovered that he couldn't find one. His desire to see Nezumi was simply that; desire. There was no reason behind it, he just wanted to see him. "It's just that I-"

"Well, whatever, Shion," Safu interrupted him, taking a few steps backwards. "I'll see you tomorrow morning."

"Y-Yeah, I'll see you then," Shion called towards her retreating back, a hand raised in an obeisance of farewell that she couldn't see. He slowly made his way towards the staircase to the higher floors of the school, thinking to himself. Was he a bad friend to Safu? It was true that he had spent less time with her so far this year than he had when they were younger. When they were kids, they would spend nearly every moment together; they would study every night after school and walk home together, they'd walk to school together and they were always in the same class. Their days off were spent in libraries or sometimes shops when Shion was up for humoring Safu. He had many, many fond memories of dinner with her and her kindhearted grandmother, memories of playing in the rain as little kids and memories of stargazing. When he stopped to consider it, Safu was the person who he could always turn to and rely on. Was he doing a terrible job of returning the favor?

"Why the long face, kid?"

Shion blinked away tears that he hadn't acknowledged until that moment, and looked up to see a concerned expression on Nezumi's face; purely out of habit, he had subconsciously made his way to Nezumi's classroom. Nezumi put down the book he was read, something in English, and made his way towards Shion. "W-What?"

"You look like you're about to cry," Nezumi said more gently as Shion closed the classroom door behind him. "Hey, Shion."

When Shion turned around towards the classroom again, he froze in surprise at the closeness of Nezumi; Nezumi ruffled Shion's white hair affectionately and looked down at him with concern. "Seriously, Shion. What's wrong?"

"N-Nothing!" Shion said with false but convincing brightness, smiling. "It's nice to see you, sensei!"

"Liar," Nezumi mumbled to himself, not even trying to be quiet about it. He ran his hand through Shion's hair once more before stepping back and making his way back towards his desk. "Yeah, nice to see you, too."

Shion smiled widely at his response and followed the taller man happily to his desk, immediately bombarding him with questions about his summer vacation.

* * *

A few days after school opened again, Shion was once again in Nezumi's classroom, sitting on top of the desk directly across from Nezumi's, a Biology textbook lay open in his lap. His eyes scanned the page with unexpected speed, showing Shion's comprehension and familiarity with the vocabulary and information. Nezumi watched him read for a minute or two, comparing and contrasting this absorption in science to his expressions when he read the old literature found in Nezumi's closet. He found that the two were very different, and decided he liked Shion's facial expressions when he read Shakespeare more. "Hey, Shion?"

"Mmm?" Shion hummed in response, his eyes still on the textbook. Nezumi leaned back and put his feet up on his desk, glancing out the window; it had been hours since lessons ended.

"What are you interested in?" Nezumi asked, honestly curious. How could someone love both science and Shakespeare with equal enthusiasm, different as the two were?

"Interested in?" Shion repeated Nezumi's question, looking up from the small, printed text to meet Nezumi's inquisitive gaze with his own. "What do you mean by that?"

"Oh, come on," Nezumi replied, lacing his fingers behind his head and raising an eyebrow at Shion's response to his question. "Your life definitely can't revolve around Shakespeare, school and studying!"

"It kind of does," Shion mumbled. "I hang out with Safu, too."

"Seriously," Nezumi pressed. "What else are you interested in?"

"Mmmm," Shion tilted his head as he considered the question, biting his lip as he thought about it. "I guess... Hmm... I like... Cherry cake?"

Nezumi blinked; he wasn't expecting an answer like that. "Cherry cake?"

"Yes."

Nezumi held Shion's gaze for a few more silent moments, before a chuckle bubbled from his closed lips; he suddenly started laughing, covering his mouth as his shoulders shook as he tried to hold back his laughter but failed miserably. Shion blushed furiously and crossed his arms defensively; he didn't think that was a bad answer at all! Nezumi's laughter eventually died away and he got up from where he sat in his chair, sitting on top of his desk and facing Shion, grinning. "That's a perfect answer for a natural like you, Shion. Cherry cake, is it?"

"I don't see what's so funny about that," Shion said, embarrassed. Nezumi grinned wider.

"Cherry cake isn't an activity, Shion."

"Well! You already know the things I like to do! I like to read; I like Shakespeare and I like things like Biology and Ecology and Chemistry, even though Ecology is my favorite," Shion blurted defensively. "A-And I... I help my mother bake sometimes, and cherry cake is what I make the best. And I hang out with Safu, too!"

Nezumi listened to Shion's defensive rambling and watched Shion's determined expression with concealed affection; it was so interesting and amusing to see Shion like this, embarrassed and enthusiastic at the same time. It was one of the endearing things about Shion that captivated Nezumi, although he would never say it out loud.

"And I like stars, too," Shion finished somewhat lamely, scratching his cheek with a finger sheepishly, his cheeks still dusted with a light pink blush. Nezumi tilted his head.

"Stars?" Nezumi repeated, slightly surprised.

"Yeah!" Shion said, smiling. "When I was younger, and my mother had more free time and didn't have to work as much, we would watch the stars together. She would show me the constellations, but I can't remember them anymore."

"Your mom works a lot, then?" Nezumi asked, realizing this was the first time Shion mentioned anything about his family. "What does she do?"

"She's a nurse," Shion said brightly, smiling. "Isn't that a nice job to have? She works a lot, though, so it's a little lonely."

"That is a nice job," Nezumi agreed, smiling at the obvious admiration Shion help for his mother. "What about your father?"

Nezumi saw it; how Shion's smile faltered ever so slightly, how his eyes hardened with some foreign emotion, how there was the smallest of hesitations before Shion's response. "He travels a lot for work, so he's rarely home."

Shion was lying, and Nezumi knew it. He could see it in Shion's eyes and hear it in his voice. But he still replied with an indifferent, "I see. That's too bad."

"Yeah," Shion said, quickly closing the subject. He opened his mouth to say something else, but his eyes strayed to the clock behind Nezumi's desk. "Is it really that late already?"

"Hmm?" Nezumi turned to check the time; it was already almost eight, and the sun was declining quickly in the sky. "Oh, I guess so."

"Damn," Shion cursed, jumping off the desk and quickly shoving his textbook in his bag. "I wasn't paying attention."

"What's the hurry?"

"I had to get home by seven," Shion said miserably, slinging his bag over his shoulder and throwing another worried look at the clock.

"I'm sorry for keeping you," Nezumi said with genuine regret. He glanced out the window at the dark sky and frowned. "Do you want me to drive you home?"

"I don't want to be a burden on you," Shion said, but Nezumi waved that aside, grabbing his own brief case from on top of his desk and standing up, stretching.

"I have no reason to stay here, anyway. It'd be more of a burden to make me worry about you walking home in the dark," Nezumi replied, and he couldn't help but smile at the grateful smile that spread across Shion's face.

* * *

"I'm riding in sensei's car~" Shion said in a sing-song voice, bouncing happily in his seat as Nezumi drove down the dark street, the light streaming from streetlamps illuminating Shion's face at odd intervals. His previous anxiety seemed to be forgotten and he smiled widely at Nezumi. "Thank you so much."

"It's no problem," Nezumi replied. "I have no idea where I'm going, though. You'll have to give me directions."

"Okay!"

Nezumi had to admit that he felt slightly nervous; Shion was in his car. Shion was so close to him, a student that he barely knew. At least, he told himself he barely knew Shion. But their relationship was becoming increasingly more personal as the days wore on. He didn't dislike it, but it felt surreal to him.

When they eventually arrived to Shion's home, which was closer than Nezumi expected, Shion seemed to be slightly hesitant to get out of Nezumi's car. "Is something wrong?"

"A-Ah, not at all," Shion said quickly, smiling. He opened the door of the car and stepped out, pulling his bag out of the car and slinging it over his shoulder, smiling once more at Nezumi before closing the door, He leaned in through the open window. "Thank you so much, sensei."

"Do you want me to walk you in?" Nezumi asked, suddenly desperate to spend a few more moments with Shion. He felt ashamed of himself for getting so attached so easily, but he was drawn to Shion. He couldn't help himself.

"No!" Shion said far too quickly. Nezumi raised an eyebrow and Shion bit his lip, glancing backwards at the house before shaking his head again. "No, that'd be a bad idea."

"What? Why?" Nezumi wondered why Shion phrased it that way, as though there'd be some consequence.

"It's just that my dad's home tonight," Shion said more quietly. "He hates it when I'm late."

Nezumi frowned at that, suddenly calculating; was Shion on bad terms with his father? But it wasn't just sadness and worry in Shion's face. His eyes shone with _fear_; he was terrified to go inside, and that was a terribly bad sign to Nezumi. He stepped out of the car without another word, closing the door behind him. "I'm walking you to the door."

"Sensei, but-"

"Come on," Nezumi interrupted him, taking his arm and starting up the drive to Shion's front door. Shion stepped closer to Nezumi's side, gripping his bag tightly. Nezumi gave him a worried look but Shion's eyes were set forward, his lips pressed into a thin line. Why was he so nervous?

"Shion, why are you so scared?" Nezumi asked gently when they reached the front door. Shion bit his lip and shook his head, looking up at Nezumi. "Shion."

"Sensei, it's fine, it's just-" Shion began nervously, but in the middle of his sentence the door opened, revealing a young, pretty woman with long brown hair.

"Shion, where have you been? Your father is- Oh, hello," The woman noticed Nezumi with surprise. "Who is this?"

"I'm Nezumi. I teach at the school Shion attends," Nezumi said smoothly before Shion could stutter out a reply. Nezumi extended a hand. "I apologize for keeping him so late."

"Oh, it's fine, it's fine," The woman said, smiling kindly. She took Nezumi's hand. "I'm Karan. I hope Shion didn't cause you too much trouble."

"Not at all," Nezumi replied.

"Can I invite you in for dinner, Nezumi?" Karan asked kindly. Nezumi saw concealed terror in Shion's eyes at those words, gripping the handle of his bag so tightly that his knuckles were white.

"No, I couldn't intrude-"

"Karan! Is that Shion? What the hell took him so long?"

Shion closed his eyes and took a shuddering breath, and a man appeared behind Karan, who jumped slightly in surprise. The man looked disgruntled and disheveled, his eyes bleary and red as he glared at Nezumi. He was swaying in place even though he stood still; Nezumi could smell the alcohol on him even though he was a few feet away. He shoved Karan out of the way to get a better look at Nezumi, the woman in question stumbling out of view for a moment before standing behind him tentatively, looking at Nezumi with wary eyes. From the looks of things, the man had more than a few drinks that night.

'_This must happen a lot... Shion's father..._' Nezumi suddenly felt an overwhelming amount of sympathy for the fragile boy beside him, who took a small step closer to him.

"The hell are you?" The man asked in a loud, rude voice.

"He's Shion's teacher, Yoming," Karan said quietly.

"I apologize for keeping Shion from you for so long," Nezumi said, looking up at Yoming confidently. "It's no fault of Shion's."

"I'm sure it is," Yoming grumbled, turning his glare to Shion. "He's always screwing up some way or another."

Nezumi's eyes widened slightly in disbelief. Yoming sighed deeply and reached out, grabbing onto Shion's hand and roughly pulling him into the doorway. "Wait, Shion-"

"Thanks for taking care of our boy," Yoming said with a slight slur. He gave Shion's arm a rough tug. "Shion, thank your teacher for driving you home."

"Thank you, sensei," Shion said quietly, avoiding Nezumi's eyes.

Karan smiled at Nezumi weakly before going to close the door. Just before it closed completely, Nezumi said loudly, "I'll see you tomorrow, Shion!"

The door closed without a response.


	6. Chapter 6

Nezumi drove home after that in absolute silence; his windows were rolled up and the radio was silenced by it's owner. The infrequent and irregular flashes of light, provided by the occasional streetlight and passing car, illuminated Nezumi's figure; if you were to be right there next to him, you could see the frustrated set of his jaw and the way his lips were pressed together in a tight line, his knuckles white from gripping the steering wheel far too tightly, and his silver eyes narrowed slightly. Always, at every moment on his drive home, he had half a mind to stop the car in the middle of the road and race back to where Shion was; where Shion was scared, where Shion wasn't safe. Nezumi wanted to speed down the road and burst into that house, take Shion by the hand and take him somewhere safe. He had never really thought about Shion's home life, but if he were to consider it he would have assumed that Shion had the perfect family and home; two hard-working, adoring parents who gave him all of the love and affection and attention he wanted and deserved, possibly a young sibling, in a large house where Shion always had everything he needed. Nezumi now saw that it wasn't like that, and he knew he would never judge by someone's appearance again. No matter how sweet and gentle Shion was, his home was the exact opposite.

Nezumi could tell, by Shion's worry in the classroom and his hesitance to set foot outside of Nezumi's car, that this wasn't a rare occurrence; rather, Shion seemed absolutely accustomed to it. He seemed used to it, even. He didn't fight back, didn't stand up for himself, didn't speak up.

Nezumi pulled into the parking lot of his apartment building and sat in the car for a moment in silence, his head back against the headrest and his eyes closed. Should he go back? He wondered if there was any point. In addition to the fact that it wasn't his business, and he could get into legal trouble; breaking and entering was, of course, punishable by law. As was kidnapping a teenage boy. Would it be kidnapping? Yoming would definitely make it out to be so. Regardless of those things, Shion most definitely didn't want Nezumi to; Nezumi saw it in Shion's eyes. He wanted Nezumi to leave as early as possible. Was it because he was worried about Nezumi, or because he was angry at Nezumi for causing this?

That thought, the thought that inflicted such immeasurable self-hatred and regret, kept Nezumi up for half of the night; it _was_ Nezumi's fault, no matter how he considered the circumstances. Nezumi was the one who kept Shion after school for so long, who continued bringing Shion into conversation even though he was well aware of the time. He just wanted to talk to Shion, to get to know Shion; he knew now that it was too dangerous to be selfish when it came to Shion. Shion, who was so entirely selfless, who was genuine and kind, was the person Nezumi needed to consider.

When Nezumi closed his eyes, he saw Shion; he saw Shion trying to seem as though he wasn't afraid even though the terror shone clear in his eyes, he saw Shion's hands gripping his school bag so tightly to keep them from trembling, he saw Shion's hesitance to get out of Nezumi's car and go home. Shion was afraid- no, Shion was /terrified/. How long had Shion's life been like that? Did that girl, Safu, know about it? If so, why hadn't she done anything? Shion, who seemed to Nezumi to be so gentle and fragile and feeble and _breakable_, was left alone there. Who would help him?

Nezumi felt as though he would be haunted by this forever.

* * *

Shion didn't come to Nezumi's classroom the next afternoon. Nezumi waited after school for an hour before decided that Shion had already gone home. Nezumi stared out the window. Was Shion angry? If he was, Nezumi couldn't blame him. But that didn't mean he liked it.

He wanted to see Shion so he could apologize, over and over and over again, no matter how out of character it was for him to do so.

* * *

Nezumi didn't see Shion at school for the rest of that school week; and he learned that Shion wasn't avoiding Nezumi, he was absent; of course, he could have been skipping to avoid Nezumi, but that wasn't in Shion's character at all. He saw Safu, the girl who Shion always hung around, walking in the hallways alone with a slightly worried expression on her face.

"Oi, Nezumi!"

Nezumi blinked and broke away from his reverie, looking up from the essay he had been grading for the past hour to meet gazes with Inukashi, who was leaning across Nezumi's desk with an irritated expression on his face. "What, Inukashi?"

"I saaaaaaaaid," Inukashi said loudly, drawing the word out and reaching across the desk to poke Nezumi's forehead. "Drive me home!"

"Fix your damn motorcycle."

"It's in the shop," Inukashi grumbled, straightening up and crossing his arms. "You wont believe how expensive it is. Anyways, I took the train this morning, and I'm NEVER doing that again. Did you know they don't let dogs on it?!"

"The horror."

"I know!"

As much as Inukashi irritated Nezumi, drove him up the wall and made him want to hit everything in sight, he was grateful to have a friend like that. Inukashi was someone who could make Nezumi forget everything; maybe that was why Nezumi kept him around for so long.

Saturday afternoon, after classes were let out and the students had the rest of the weekend to do whatever they liked, Inukashi kept Nezumi preoccupied; he didn't know what exactly was wrong with his friend, but he understood that there _was _something wrong and was going to do his best to cheer him up. Nezumi recognized this and was grateful; but being around Inukashi, spending his Sunday reading books by himself and grading papers made him realize how he longed for the classroom after school, where Shion was, where there was someone he could talk to. He still couldn't explain it, but he felt as though Shion was the one person in the world who could ever possibly understand Nezumi, to accept all of his faults and, at the end of the day, still smile and say, "I'll see you tomorrow." Nezumi couldn't lose a person like that. It wasn't as though he spent every waking moment thinking about Shion, absolutely not, but his absence was still prominent. Nezumi missed him.

So where was Shion? Nezumi was getting restless and worried.

* * *

Shion and Safu sat on the roof in silence, their bento boxes lay empty and forgotten at their sides. The wind brushed Shion's hair from his face and caressed his cheeks, and Safu's eyes were once again drawn to the bandage on Shion's face; the one that lead from his cheek to his neck and disappeared under the collar of his shirt. Safu bit her lip and raised a hand, as though to touch Shion or comfort him in some way, but found she didn't know how. Shion caught this movement as she lowered her hand and smiled brightly at her.

"Don't worry about it, Safu," Shion said, leaning to the side and bumping shoulders with her, grinning. "You know it's not as bad as it looks. It doesn't hurt anymore."

"You should've called me," Safu said quietly, making her resolve and reaching over to press her hand to Shion's uninjured cheek, her eyes wet with tears. "You should've come over. You should've called, damn it. I told you, Shion, if it got any worse to _call_ someone-"

"You know mom doesn't want that," Shion interrupted, covering Safu's hand on his cheek with his own, smiling more gently. "It's fine, Safu. You know it's nothing I can't handle."

"That doesn't matter," Safu snapped, pulling her hand back and glaring at her friend. "Shion, it doesn't matter if you can _handle_ it. Sure, it's fine this time. What if it's not fine next time? He's getting worse and worse, you _maybe_ that. And this isn't even the worse he's ever done. What are you going to do next time, when maybe he wont pass out, when maybe he's even _angrier_, if maybe your mom isn't home, if-"

"Safu."

Safu bit her lip and looked away.

* * *

Shion hesitantly opened the door to Nezumi's classroom, peeking inside before walking into the room entirely, closing the door behind him. He took a deep, silent breath before smiling and waving cheerfully. "Hiya, sensei!"

"Shion," Nezumi looked up from his book in surprise. As Shion dropped his bag on a desk and opened it to retrieve his homework, Nezumi's eyes narrowed and he closed his book, standing up. "What the hell, Shion?"

"Eh?" Shion looked up in surprise, abandoning his things in his bag and turning around, leaning against the desk as Nezumi made his way over to him. "What do you mean?"

"I don't expect you were sick for a week," Nezumi said, raising an eyebrow. He began to say something else before he noticed the bandage on Shion's cheek; he frowned. "What happened?"

"A-Ah, this? Nothing, I just fell." Shion's lie was absolutely terrible. Nezumi took a few steps closer and put his hand on Shion's cheek, running his finger across the bandage. "W-Well, I mean. . ."

"Was it your father?" Nezumi asked quietly, his eyes still on the bandage. His eyes followed it's path; from a quarter of a way into Shion's cheek and then training down his neck and eventually disappearing against his collar bone, covered by Shion's shirt. Nezumi bit his lip and looked back at Shion's face. "Well?"

"Yeah," Shion said, not seeing the point in lying to Nezumi."

"What... What did he-"

"He burned me," Shion replied, already knowing what the question was before it even left Nezumi's lips. For having taken Nezumi so far into his personal life, back to his home and into his problems, he felt immensely guilty. Nezumi at least deserved to know all of the facts, didn't he? Shion gently peeled the bandage off his face and from around his neck. "It doesn't hurt anymore, so it's fine, see?"

Nezumi brushed Shion's cheek with his thumb; the angry red scar wound around Shion's cheek and neck. Nezumi felt himself flinch inwardly at the thought of how much pain Shion was in. "Shion..."

Nezumi needed to see it, the whole thing; at least most of it. He needed to know what he put Shion through. He put his hands on both of Shion's shoulders and slip his blaze down so that the sleeves were down to his elbows. Shion bit his lip as Nezumi slowly began unbuttoning his shirt, a dark red blush dusting his cheeks. He knew it was nothing like_ that_, that Nezumi just wanted to see his scar, but he still felt his cheeks grow hot. He held his breath as Nezumi continued unbuttoning his shirt, Nezumi's eyes intent on his task, unaware that Shion's eyes were on Nezumi's hands, Nezumi's eyes, just on_ Nezumi_ and how close he was. "Oh, fuck, Shion..."

Nezumi saw the way the scar wound around Shion's torso; a light, almost pinkish red that twisted around Shion like a snake, like some terrible secret. Nezumi felt sick to his stomach and felt an uncontrollable rage rise up in his stomach. Shion saw it in Nezumi's eyes and said gently, "It's fine, sensei-"

"It's not fine. It's my fault," Nezumi said, meeting Shion's gaze with his own remorseful one. "Shion, I'm so sorry."

"It's not in your character to apologize, sensei," Shion said with a small smile. "It's not your fault. It's mine."

"Don't say that," Nezumi sighed. "It's mine, and you know it is."

"Sensei-" Shion began to argue, but he was caught in surprise as Nezumi suddenly wrapped his arms around Shion's waist, hugging him tightly. Shion felt his blush resurface, his face pressed against Nezumi's chest, his eyes wide with shock. Nezumi's arms tightened around him, gripping his shirt around his waist and on his back.

"Fuck, I'm so sorry," Nezumi's muffled voice came from close next to Shion's ear. Shion closed his eyes and wrapped his arms around Nezumi's neck, hugging him in response; maybe they were embracing for two different reasons, Nezumi out of pity and Shion out of affection, but Shion didn't care; he was so close to Nezumi that he could hear him breath, that he could feel his heart beat. "Shion, I'm so sorry."

"It's not-"

"Don't say it's not my fault," Nezumi muttered, and Shion couldn't help but laugh. He felt Nezumi tighten his embrace in response and smiled to himself. "Why the /hell/ didn't you ever say anything?"

"I did, to Safu," Shion defended. His arms slid down from around Nezumi's neck and he rested his hands on Nezumi's chest, gripping his shirt gently. He didn't want to give up their embrace just yet. "It's not a big deal, either."

"'Not a big deal'?" Nezumi repeated, pulling back a few inches to look at Shion incredulously. "You've got to be kidding me, Shion."

"I'm fine, aren't I?" Shion argued, and Nezumi narrowed his eyes.

"Barely."

"That's not even the worse tha-" Shion began, before realizing what he was about to confess and pressing his lips together quickly to keep himself from finishing his sentence. But the damage was already done, and Nezumi's eyes widened in surprise. "Um. I mean, that, um-"

"Damn it, Shion," Nezumi glared at him and Shion averted his eyes, gripping Nezumi's shirt slightly tighter in his hands. It hadn't escaped his attention that Nezumi's arms were still wound around him and he found it slightly difficult to focus on anything except for that. "What else has-"

"Look, I'm fine. It's fine," Shion interrupted, looking up at Nezumi again. "You don't need to worry about me."

"What a ridiculous thing to say," Nezumi grumbled. He held Shion's gaze for another moment for sighing, reaching up with one hand to run it through Shion's hair, before resting his hand on Shion's cheek, brushing the angry scar with his thumb. "Just... next time call the school or something so I don't have to wonder where you are. I was worried."

Shion tilted his head. "I did call the school."

"Well, call me."

"But I don't-"

Nezumi rolled his eyes and reach across the desk to where Shion's bag lay. Before Shion could protest, Nezumi had already taken Shion's phone into his hand and was busy entering his number into it. Shion couldn't help but smile slightly at that, and looked away in order to hide his blush; he had to admit to himself, though he would never say it out loud because Nezumi would surely kill him, but those past few moments in the classroom together would be worth all of the pain in the world.

"There," Nezumi said, handing the phone back to Shion. Their embrace was finally broken and Nezumi was walking back to his desk with an air of indifference, collapsing back into his desk chair and picking up his book again. "Now you have no excuse."

"I wasn't making excuses," Shion grumbled, quickly buttoning his shirt up again with a blush still present on his cheeks. He slid his cell phone back into his bag and pulled out his textbook. He sighed as he slumped down behind a desk, opening the textbook. "I have so much to do," Shion sighed to himself.

"I thought you were some kind of genius," Nezumi said, looking up from his book to smirk at Shion. "Surely this is child's play."

"I-I didn't say it was difficult or anything! It's easy!"

"Sure, sure."

Nezumi looked back down at his book then, and Shion watched him for a moment with a smile on his face, before looking back down at his textbook and tackling all of the homework he had to make up.


	7. Chapter 7

"I don't understand!"

Safu groaned in frustration, collapsing in her seat, crossing her arms on the desk and burying her face in the sleeves of her uniform, letting out another exasperated sigh. "You've been studying like... like you don't even _care_ anymore, and yet you still scored higher than me!"

"They're just midterms. You'll definitely beat me when it's time for finals," Shion comforted her, leaning against her desk with the ghost of a smile playing at the corners of his lips. He wouldn't dare say it out loud, at least, not while he was in such close proximity to Safu and several sharp pencils and pens that could potentially kill him, but he found it extremely amusing how competitive Safu was, _especially_ when it came to academics. Shion wished he could say it was easy for him, that he finished with plenty of time to spare, that he hardly even studied and still passed with flying colors, but Safu would definitely kill him. "So cheer up, Safu."

"Cheer up," Safu repeated, mockingly and slightly skeptically. She huffed and sat up straight in her chair, a picture of perfect posture, with her arms and legs crossed as she gave Shion a mighty and superior look. "Well, it's worthless, regardless. We'll have an entirely new set of material, and I'm going to study the entire textbook this weekend. I'll have it memorized and perfected before we even open our books on Monday."

"I'm not sure that's even possible, Safu," Shion told her, grinning and holding his hands up in defense as Safu shot him a glare. "I mean, of course it is. You can do anything."

"Damn right I can do anything," Safu grumbled. Shion laughed and ruffled her hair before returning to his seat on the other side of the classroom, oblivious to the blush and gaze that followed him. Safu sighed and looked down at her desk, a slight pout on her lips. "You're so stupid, Shion."

Shion rested his chin on his hand, gazing out the window at the yellow and red leaves falling to the ground. They were three fourths of the way through the school year, and he still felt as though he hadn't done anything. He subconsciously touched his angry red scar on his face, so similar to a serpent winding around him, and blushed at the thought that he might have still felt the ghost of Nezumi's fingers caressing his cheek. He always found himself remembering Nezumi's gentle words, his arms around him, his breath so close. Shion knew better than anyone else that it was absolutely ridiculous to develop feelings for a teacher; even worse, he had developed feelings for another male, though that part didn't really bother Shion. Nezumi was a teacher, an upperclassmen teacher. Shion tilted his head and continued watching leaves fall to the ground; how old was Nezumi, anyway? Shion remembered Nezumi telling him that he graduated from college after only three years, a genius in his own class and generation, and became a teacher at the age of twenty one. That still left far too many empty periods and unsure years for Shion to calculate his age. Shion decided to ask him that afternoon.

* * *

"How old am I?" Nezumi repeated Shion's question, titling his head with an eyebrow raised. "Why does it matter?"

"Because I was wondering about it," Shion said brightly, sitting on top of the desk across from Nezumi's with his legs crossed, smiling. "Is that a bad question?"

"Not a bad one, I suppose," Nezumi said with a sigh. He leaned back in his chair. "I'm twenty-five."

"Twenty-five... That's so young!" Shion exclaimed in surprise.

"I skipped a year in high school, and one in college," Nezumi said indifferently. Shion looked at him in awe, and Nezumi averted his eyes in order to hide his flushed cheeks. Shion's words shouldn't have pleased him as much as they did. "It's not that difficult. I'm sure the same opportunity will be offered to you, as well."

"Oh, it has," Shion said, rocking back and forth from where he sat, like a child. "Several times! I really don't want to skip a grade, though. Because I'd feel guilty about leaving Safu behind."

"The same wasn't offered to her?" Nezumi asked, a little surprised.

"It was, but she said she'd like to spend as much time in school as she can," Shion said, and there was a warm smile on his face, accompanied by the fond tone of his voice. "She says she likes feeling superior to the other people in our class."

"How pleasant," Nezumi murmured, and Shion's sparkling laughter filled the room.

"She really is. She's just got a little bit of a superiority complex," Shion said with a grin.

"Have you two always been friends?"

"Always!" Shion said with a nod, his smile growing more earnest. "Ever since we've been really little. Now that you mention it, I can't remember how exactly we became friends, but I care about her a lot."

* * *

Safu could remember every moment of her time with Shion, including their very first meeting. She remembered the way his white hair caught the sunlight on the first day of grade school, how he smiled brightly at her, as he had to every single other person in their class. Safu found herself staring at him when he smiled, when he laughed, when he had a thoughtful expression on his face. She remembered how she had confidently walked over to him, throwing her homework down next to his on his desk and announced that they were going to do their homework together, whether he liked it or not. Her words were met with a bright smile.

Ever since then, every day, Safu was next to him. Watching him, smiling and laughing with him, learning and growing by his side as two best friends did.

If she asked herself when, exactly, she fell in love with Shion, she knew she would never be able to answer; and since she hadn't problems she couldn't solve, she purposely circled around and avoided that question, focusing on the love itself. Shion was just so bright and happy and /beautiful/. Everyone liked Shion; it was an absolute fact. Everyone who had met him left his presence with a smile on their face and warm memories in their hearts. He was always offered the position of Class Representative and he always shot it down, with a sheepish expression on his face. "Safu's better at those things," he always said, because he knew how much Safu wanted to be class rep. Always, always, he was looking out for her.

Always he was looking out for her.

When she was bullied by the other kids in her class, when her parents died and she was taken up by her grandmother, when she scored under one hundred percent on a test; however petty or important her problems were, Shion held her and promised her that everything was going to be okay. With Shion's arms around her, she could easily believe those words; Shion was there, so everything was okay. Everything would be okay if Shion was there.

"But now..." Safu murmured to herself, watching Shion leave the classroom as soon as he could.

He was intrigued and caught up by that upperclassmen teacher, Nezumi-sensei, the one who had stolen Shion away from her without even so much as the breath or whisper of a threat. One moment Shion was hers, and the next he was under the spell of a man with poetry for words and eyes the color of moonlight. What was she supposed to do? How was she supposed to fight with someone who could make Shion fall in love with them at the very first mention of _The Happy Prince_ and starcrossed lovers?

She gazed at Shion's empty desk, and wondered how long, exactly, she had been sitting alone.

* * *

It was raining the next day.

The rain fell in large, fast-falling drops that smacked against the pavement and pummeled on the windows. Students ran under the cover of bags and jackets and hastily retrieved umbrellas, aiming for the cover of the school or a tree or anywhere that would be a relief from the rain. Nezumi watched the rain fall from his classroom window, his students piling in with drops of water dripping from their hair and bags. Nezumi raised an eyebrow at them and murmured something about having to clean up later, rewarded by the laughter of his students but without the promise of assistance. He'd just make Inukashi do it later.

As he went through his lectures for the day, he decided that every shade of hair and every splash of color in the irises of his students were all very dull and boring compared to Shion; his snow white hair and bright red eyes were hard to rival, Nezumi knew, and it was really quite an unfair comparison, but he couldn't help it. Everything seemed boring compared to his afternoons with Shion. His conversations with Inukashi, too, were tiring and tedious. He wanted to talk about /books/, about laughter and memories and ages and other really unimportant things, as long as he could talk about them with Shion.

He realized he was thinking about Shion far too much; Shion was a /student/, after all, but Nezumi could hardly help himself. It was the effect that Shion had on people, and he couldn't avoid it. Everything reminded him of Shion. Red flowers and rain on the windows and white blank pages and silence. It all came back to him. Nezumi knew it was dangerous to develop... less than /innocent/ feelings for someone like Shion, for a student, for someone who was almost nine years younger than him, but he found that there was nothing he could do about it now that these thoughts had started appearing in his head.

"Oi!"

Nezumi blinked and looked up from his book. Inukashi was glaring at him angrily, glasses slightly askew and slipping down the bridge of his nose.

"I've been trying to talk to you for the past minute."

"A whole minute, you say? I'm so sorry for keeping his majesty waiting for such a long time," Nezumi said, his voice dripping with sarcasm. Inukashi grumbled and crossed his arms. "What do you want?"

"So harsh, so harsh," Inukashi sighed tragically. "I was _wondering_ what was wrong with you. You're all... moony eyed.

"There's nothing wrong," Nezumi said, an eyebrow raised. "I guess maybe all the extra-grading from Midterms has got me tired."

"I feel you, man," Inukashi agreed, nodding his head enthusiastically. "I hardly slept these past few days!"

"Mmm."

"The pressure," Inukashi sighed, sinking down to his knees and crossing his arms on Nezumi's desk. "It's getting to me. I'm too tired to walk my dogs. And they hate being ignored, Nezumi. They're always _watching_ me. With their eyes."

"What else would they watch you with?"

"Their _eyes_, Nezumi," Inukashi whispered, his eyes growing wide and his lower lip trembling. "They're so pitiful, so I _have_ to play with them. And by the time I get home, it's already after dark! Can you believe that?"

"So it's really your own fault that you're staying up so late," Nezumi said, and Inukashi groaned.

"You're SO not sympathetic. If I keep staying up late, I'll catch a cold!"

"Don't worry, you'll never catch a cold." [1]

"I hope no... WAIT."

* * *

"Shion."

Nezumi froze on his way down the hallway, hearing Shion's name being called from the staircase leading from the first floor to the second.

"What's wrong, Safu?"

"S-Shion... I have something to tell you!" The girl, Safu, stammered out after a moment, and Nezumi could almost picture the blush on her face. "It's important."

'I'm above eavesdropping, I'm definitely above eavesdropping,' Nezumi repeated to himself in his thoughts; but still, he stood flat against the wall, out of sight, and strained his ears. This situation was dangerous. He knew of only one reason a girl would call her classmate to meet after school, and he didn't like the fact that it was /Shion/ being called to right now.

"Is something wrong?" Shion's voice was concerned. Ah, so like Shion.

"No, there isn't anything wrong. I just wanted to talk to you."

"What did you want to talk about?"

Nezumi clenched his fists and turned his face towards the direction of their voices, training to hear. It was coming, and Nezumi didn't want to hear it. No, really, it wasn't the confession that Nezumi didn't want to hear, it was Shion's response that terrified him.

"I'm in love with you, Shion."

There was a moment of stunned silence, and Nezumi felt his heart drop at the words. What was he, a child? Of course Shion would be confessed to, and of course he would accept, and of course Nezumi wouldn't care. And Shion would start going on dates with her after school, and they would no long see each other, and, really, it was for the best-

"I'm sorry, Safu."

Nezumi's heart stopped.

"I can't return your feelings, Safu, and I'm so sorry," Shion said quietly.

"It's that teacher, isn't it?"

Nezumi edged closer to the staircase, straining to hear.

"W-Wha... I-I..."

"You don't even have to say it," Safu's words were chopped and unforgiving. "I can see it in your eyes, when it's the end of the day and you immediately jump out of your seat. You're in love with him, aren't you?"

"Safu, that's... I mean, I..."

Nezumi covered his mouth with his hand, his eyes closed and a blush spreading across his face. He shouldn't be there, it wasn't his place. He immediately turned away from the stairs and made his way back to his classroom, trying to fight back the smile that was trying to force it's way to his lips. He hadn't overheard a thing, he hadn't heard a thing from their conversation.

He closed the classroom door behind him and leaned against it. He had heard it, though, and it just made everything so much more difficult.

* * *

Shion slowly made his way to Nezumi's classroom, Safu's words echoing in his head. Was he actually in /love/ with Nezumi? Did his feelings actually go that far? Was his heartbeat evidence of this? Those moments that he spent bored out his mind over the summer, those passages from old Shakespeare plays that he had memorized overnight, and that time when they were so close that Shion could feel Nezumi's heart beating right alongside his... Were those all little fragments of the love that Shion had for Nezumi?

"Hey, sensei!"

Shion was as cheerful as always when he walked into Nezumi's classroom, a bright smile on his face. Nezumi looked up from his book to meet Shion's gaze; there was something slightly different about his expression, but Nezumi nodded in greeting all the same. "Yo."

"It's raining a lot today," Shion said with a sigh, dropping his bag on a desk and walking over to the other side of the classroom, looking out the window. "I actually kind of hate it."

"I never thought I'd hear you say you hate something," Nezumi said with a smirk, referring to Shion's always happy personality.

"Mmm," Shion hummed. "I hate the summer, too."

"Is that all?"

"I also hate coffee," Shion said, after a moment of consideration. "But that's it."

"Why coffee?" Nezumi asked, amused. What a random thing to dislike.

"It's bitter," Shion said, making a face.

The conversation earlier wasn't forgotten by either of them, but the both of them pretended it had never happened; Shion because he was was debating within himself, and also because there was no way Shion ever wanted Nezumi to discover how he felt, and Nezumi because he was never supposed to have even been aware of it. So they talked and laughed as they always did, because that was normal and it was what friends did.

But neither of them could stop thinking about it.

* * *

"Damn..."

"What's wrong?"

"I forgot my umbrella."

The two of them were standing at the entrance of the school, about to go their separate ways for the day and for the weekend, when Shion remembered that he had walked to school with Safu that morning, and didn't have an umbrella of his own. He bit his lip and pulled up his sleeve, looking at his watch. Nezumi watched him and debated with himself for a moment before shoving his hands in his pockets and looking straight ahead.

"I could drive you."

Shion looked up at him, an unreadable expression flashing across his face for a moment before he broke out into a wide and grateful smile. "Thank you!"

"No problem," Nezumi said, offering Shion a small smile before pulling out starting out to his car, leaving Shion to stumble behind him, using his bag to shield himself from the rain while he was temporarily exposed to it. Nezumi, always the gentleman, opened and closed the passenger door for Shion before getting in himself.

They drove in silence for a little while; Shion leaned forward and gazed out the window, at the lights reflecting on the puddles on the ground, at the raindrops racing down the window; Nezumi couldn't help but glance at him every few minutes. Shion's smiling face was reflected in the window, slightly distorted by the rain but still /lovely/. Now that Nezumi thought about it, fighting back and blush and forcing himself to look straight at the road again, there was no way to avoid falling in love with Shion. He was too innocent, too kind, to special to ignore. Teacher, friend, and male regardless- as soon as Shion entered his life, nothing would be the same. He should have known that from the beginning, and now that he considered it, maybe he knew it even then. Shion turned and smiled at him.

"Thank you again, sensei," Shion said earnestly, smiling once again.

"Of course. It'd be a hassle if you got sick," Nezumi said, smirking at Shion and glancing at him from the corner of his eye. "You'd be complaining about it constantly."

"I don't complain!" Shion said, puffing his cheeks out indignantly.

"Yeah, yeah."

"... Hey, sensei?"

"Hmm?"

"What do you hate?"

They reached a redlight and Nezumi looked at Shion, questioningly. "What do I hate?"

"Well, I told you the things I hate," Shion explained. "And now I'm curious."

"I see," Nezumi murmured. The light flickered a few times before turning green and he started driving again, the route to Shion's home still fresh and imprinted in his mind. "I hate... grading papers. And kids. And Inukashi, I really hate Inukashi."

Shion laughed brightly, grinning. Nezumi raised an eyebrow. "What's so funny?"

"You don't really hate any of those things," Shion explained, tilting his head and smiling. "Of course you don't."

"And why do you say that?"

"Because you grade things so quickly, right when you get them. Plus, it's a huge part of your job. If you disliked it, you wouldn't be a teacher," Shion said. "The same goes with you saying you Inukashi-sensei; if you really hated him, you wouldn't be such good friends."

"Labeling him as a 'good friend' is definitely pushing it," Nezumi grumbled.

"And as for hating kids, we're friends! So you can't," Shion finished, smiling brightly. Nezumi had to look away and hide his bush, thanking the darkness for the cover.

"Tch," Nezumi grumbled, making Shion laugh again.

"Ah, my mom's not home," Shion said, sounding surprised as they pulled up to where Shion lived. Nezumi tilted his head at Shion's expression.

"Is that a bad thing?" Nezumi asked, and Shion bit his lip.

"Ah... Well... " Shion shifted uncomfortably. "I... I, um, don't have my key, and..."

"Oh."

"Safu lives close," Shion said, but after their conversation earlier that day, he didn't think that it was a very good idea at all for him to stay there. When they were younger, they would have sleepovers all the time, but now Shion felt s though it would make things worse between them. That being said, he wasn't even sure if Safu would let him in. "So, I..."

Before Shion could even put his hand on the door handle, Nezumi started the car. Shion jumped in surprise as Nezumi backed out of the driveway and started driving, his eyes curiously set straight ahead.

"What are you doing?"

"What does it look like? I'm driving."

"But..."

"It's fine," Nezumi said. "You can stay with me for tonight."

Shion covered his mouth with his hand and looked out the window, blushing furiously. Stay with Nezumi? Over night? At his place? Shion thought that it may have been too good to be true, but he was also incredibly nervous. Was that even okay, for him to spend the night with his teacher? "T-Thanks... I'm sorry."

"It's no trouble," Nezumi said, though his voice sounded stiff, and when Shion looked up Nezumi had the lightest of blushes dusted across his cheeks.

* * *

"S-Sorry for the intrusion..."

Shion was so nervous he felt like he heart would jump right out of his chest. He slipped out of his shoes and stepped into Nezumi's apartment, looking around curiously. It was small but it suited Nezumi entirely. There were books scattered across the coffee table, but other than that it was very plain. There were papers scattered across the kitchen table and there was at least a sningle book on every available surface, but beside that it was very clean. Shion turned when he had walked to the middle of the living room and looked around seeing Nezumi walk into the main room from the hallway.

"I like it," Shion decided, smiling up at Nezumi as he walked over to him. "It's very Nezumi."

"You think so?"

Shion jumped in surprised when Nezumi attacked his hair with a towel, and he realized for the first time how cold he was. His teeth chattered lightly and Nezumi chuckled, running the towel through Shion's hair lightly, smiling fondly. Shion fought back his blush and searched desperately for something to say when he felt something brush against his ankles, and a soft meow came from below him. Shion looked down in surprise and saw a black cat circling his feet.

"You have a cat?" Shion asked, smiling and crouching down to hold his hand out to the cat. The cat sniffed Shion's hand before bumping it with it's forehead, purring gently. Shion smiled wider and looked up at Nezumi, who had walked over to the kitchen area in the large living area.

"Cats," Nezumi corrected; and as he said so, another cat jumped onto the counter next to him, a mouse that was a fair caramel color, and yet another cat came up to Shion from behind. "Inukashi found them a few years ago, but he couldn't keep them because of his dogs. I couldn't refuse."

"They're so cute," Shion sat cross-legged on the ground, the cat jumped in his lap and purred loudly. "I like cats."

"Looks like they like you, too," Nezumi said, scratching the other cat behind it's ear as he set about preparing hot chocolate. His first reaction would've been to make coffee, and he was glad that Shion already told him that he hated it.

"What're their names?"

"They don't have any."

"Eh? Why?" Shion asked in surprise; he picked up the dark cat and sat on the couch, returning the cat to his lap. He scratched the cat behind it's ears and under it's chin. "Shouldn't pets have names?"

"I never thought about it, and it seems a little late at this point," Nezumi said. Shion pouted and made a non-committal hum, leaning against the back of the couch and closing his eyes. He would have argued further, but the softness of the cat and the warmth of Nezumi's apartment made him feel suddenly drowsy.

"Shion?"

Nezumi stood in front of the couch, a mug of hot chocolate in each hand, and looked down at Shion; Shion had fallen asleep, Nezumi's cat still in his arms and the towel still wrapped around his neck. Nezumi sighed and put the cups down on the coffee table. He crouched down and touched Shion's hair gently; it was still wet.

"Shion..." He murmured, gently running his hand through Shion's soft, white hair. "You'll catch a cold."

Shion shifted slightly in his sleep, but his eyes remained closed. Nezumi tilted his head and raised an eyebrow, smiling fondly. He bit his lip and leaned forward, hesitantly, putting a hand on Shion's cheek and caressing it lightly with his thumb.

'I wonder, if I'll ever be able to find the words,' Nezumi thought to himself, gently running a fingertip across Shion's scar. He leaned closer, and he could feel Shion's breath lightly brushing against his face as he slept. The urge to kiss him, suddenly, was so strong that Nezumi found himself leaning in even closer, their lips just inches apart. 'To describe how you make me feel...'

Shion shifted again and Nezumi back up suddenly, taking a deep breath and sighing before shaking Shion's shoulder. "You'll catch a cold if you sleep here."

"Mmm?" Shion sat up drowsily, blinking slowly. He rubbed the back of his head sheepishly, laughing. "Sorry, sensei!"

"Of all the things to apologize for," Nezumi muttered to himself, still flustered from his closeness to Shion just moments ago. Shion gave him and questioning look and Nezumi just rolled his eyes. He picked up the mugs of hot chocolate again and held one out to Shion. "Whatever, just drink this."

"I love hot chocolate!" Shion exclaimed, taking the warm mug in both of his hnds and smiling up at Nezumi. "Thank you."

"Mmm," Nezumi sat down next to him, taking a sip of his own drink. It was a little sweeter than what he usually drank, but it was fine because Shion liked it so much. "I had to dig around for it, since you hate coffee."

"You remembered!" Shion said brightly, smiling. "The things I like."

"Of course."

"That makes me happy," Shion said, smiling more gently. Nezumi averted his eyes, and took another sip of his drink in order to hide his blush. How could so few words from Shion affect him as much as they did? Maybe he was losing his edge. "Sensei?"

"Yeah?" Nezumi replied, turning back to him. Shion blushed lightly and shifted in his seat, still gripping his mug in both hands.

"Thank you... for letting me stay here tonight," Shion said, looking down at his reflection in the hot chocolate. "I've thought about it before... Sensei's house."

"Does it meet your expectations?" Nezumi asked, grinning. Shion laughed and nodded.

"Yeah!"

* * *

[1]= There's a Japanese saying that if you're absent-minded and... well, you know, rather stupid, then you wont catch a cold.

Author's Note:

I'm very sorry for the delay. I made it extra long as an apology! I hope you like it! :D


	8. Chapter 8

Shion couldn't help but be nervous as he sat on Nezumi's couch. Of course, it wasn't really different than how they usually spent their time together; Shion was finishing an essay, and Nezumi was grading papers from his class. The difference was that they were in _Nezumi's_ apartment, on _Nezumi's _couch. There was little space between them- if Shion were to move to his left just twelve inches, then he and Nezumi would be merely inches apart. At the thought of that, Shion was thoroughly embarrassed by how much he _wanted_ to do that. Red-faced and flustered, he turned back to his essay, which had been neglected for quite some time now.

"Having trouble?" Nezumi asked suddenly, having noticed stopped writing. Shion smiled brightly at him and rubbed the back of his head sheepishly.

"A little bit," Shion admitted, though he didn't admit it was because he was having a very difficult time concentrating on the things on front of him, since he was rather drawn to the person sitting _next_ to him. "I'll give up for tonight."

"How unlike you," Nezumi said with a smirk, and Shion shook his head indignantly, sticking his tongue out. Nezumi laughed and ruffled his hair before turning back to the stack of papers in front of him on the coffee table. Shion leaned over closer to him, staring at the papers. Nezumi felt the heat rise to his cheeks, glancing at Shion from the corner of his eyes. "What?"

"English is really confusing," Shion finally sighed, pouting. "I can't understand any of that."

"English is actually much easier than Japanese," Nezumi said, leaning back against the couch.

"Liar."

Nezumi laughed as the black cat jumped on Shion's lap, purring and nudging Shion's cheek. Shion smiled happily and scratched the cat behind it's ears. "I still can't believe you didn't name your pets."

"Seems like a hassle," Nezumi said, smiling to himself as he watched Shion play with the cat. "I know who's who, so what does it matter?"

"It's important!" Shion insisted. "You should name them right now."

"Right now?"

"Yes!" Shion said, picking up the cat and holding it out for Nezumi's observation. The cat blinked lazily at Nezumi, their faces close together, before yawning.

"Nothing comes to mind," Nezumi said with a smirk, before taking the cat from Shion and scratching him behind the ears gently. Shion pulled his legs up onto the couch, hugging them to his chest. He rested his chin on his knees as he watched Nezumi, smiling slightly to himself. "Still, I don't think it's very important."

"It's definitely important," Shion said, reaching over and patting the cat's head softly. His hand bumped against Nezumi's and he snapped his hand back, hugging his legs to his chest again and looking down to hide his blush; why was he being so jittery now? Safu's words kept coming back to him, and he kept hearing her voice over and over again. Was he in love with Nezumi? Was it really more than just a little crush? "A-Anyway, it's just unheard of, to not name your pets. Doesn't even Inukashi-sensei name his pets?"

"Inukashi is also the strangest person I've ever met," Nezumi pointed out, grinning when Shion laughed. "But yeah, he does. And he has like seven dogs."

"So many," Shion murmured. "I don't have any pets at all, so that's kind of hard to imagine."

"You're so airheaded you'd probably forget to feed them," Nezumi said, smirking when Shion pouted indignantly. "You know it's true."

"Well, whatever," Shion grumbled.

"Eloquent as always."

Shion had noticed, as the minutes and eventually hours trickled by, that it was incredibly easy to talk to Nezumi. He found himself forgetting that Nezumi was even his teacher, that it was storming outside, that he had received a confession earlier that day that had changed his world in it's entirety. He could only think about Nezumi's voice, the way Nezumi bit his lip when he was thinking, that he was sitting next to someone he cared about immensely and that he was in that person's apartment and the taste of hot chocolate.

"So, anyway, what made you choose this high school?" Nezumi asked him after a while.

"Well, I-" Shion began, but before he could get any more words out his phone began to to ring. Shion jumped in surprise before reaching into his bag, looking up at Nezumi apologetically. "Excuse me."

"Mm," Nezumi waved a hand in accepting dismissal, standing up and stretching.

"Hello?" Shion answered without looking at the Caller ID, because it could really only be two people; his mother, or Safu.

"Shion? You're not home?" It was his mother. Her voice sounded slightly worried, and Shion felt a slight pang of guilt for forgetting to call her and tell her he wouldn't be coming home.

"A-Ah, no," Shion said quickly, as Nezumi grabbed both of the empty mugs on the coffee table and taking them into the kitchen. Shion watched his retreating figure before responding, "It was raining and I had forgotten my key, so I stayed with a friend."

"Oh? I'm sorry, Shion, I thought I would be home a lot earlier," Shion's mother said. "But I suddenly had to stay and work an extra shift. To be honest, I'm surprised you're still awake."

"Eh?" Shion looked up at the clock on the wall, and was surprised to see that it was already nearly midnight. "Oh, I hadn't realized it was that late."

"You've always been a little... unobservant."

"Why does everyone say that?" Shion grumbled. Shion's mother laughed and Shion smiled to himself. "Anyway, I'm sorry for worrying you."

"It's fine, it's fine, as long as you're somewhere safe," Shion's mother said. "I'll see you tomorrow, then."

"Good night."

Shion hung up and looked up, realizing that Nezumi was no longer in the room. Shion tilted his head before placing his phone back in his bag, standing up and stretching. Now that he realized just how late it was, he really was feeling tired. He yawned before crouching down on the ground to scratch the brown cat under it's chin, smiling. "You want a name, don't you?"

The cat meowed in a way that was expectedly non-committing, and Shion laughed under his breath. He ran his fingers through the cats soft fur. "You're such a pretty kitty, you know. Your fur's the color of pastries. That makes me hungry~"

He picked up the cat and placed it in his lap, scratching it under it's chin. "Like scones and cravats and... Ne, how would you like to be called that?"

He lifted up the cat and turned it to face him, smiling. "Cravat?" The cat meowed and Shion laughed. "I'll take that as a yes~"

"Talking to yourself?"

Shion jumped slightly and looked up to see Nezumi leaning in the doorway, smirking. He had a pillow and a blanket in his hands.

"I was talking to Cravat, for your information," Shion said indignantly, and the cat meowed in agreement. Shion grinned and started petting the cat again.

"So you named him?" Nezumi asked, sounding amused. He set the pillow and blanket down on the couch.

"Well you weren't going to!" Shion defended. "Besides, it suites him. Don't you think so, Cravat?" The cat meowed again and Shion grinned up at Nezumi.

"Don't get cheeky," Nezumi scolded, but he was smiling. "Anyway, get up. I'll show you to my bedroom."

"Eh? Why?" Shion asked, looking at the pillow and blanket on the couch.

"That's where you'll be sleeping, of course," Nezumi clarified, rolling his eyes. He held his hand out to Shion. "It astounds me how you can be unaware of the obvious."

"T-That's fine! I'll stay out here!" Shion said hastily. He looked down at the cat purring in his lap, running his finger through his fur. "I don't want to be anymore trouble."

"It's no trouble," Nezumi said. "If it were trouble, I would've left you out in the rain."

"How kind of you," Shion mumbled sarcastically. He crossed his arms and shook his head, causing Cravat to meow unhappily in his lap. "I'm sleeping out here. I'm not going be any more of an inconvenience."

"I'll drag you if I have to," Nezumi replied, raising an eyebrow at Shion. "I'd be a bad host if I made you sleep on the couch."

"I'd be an inconsiderate guest if _I_ made_ you _sleep on the couch," Shion countered, pacifying Cravat with a gentle pat on the head. Cravat meowed gratefully and rubbed against Shion's hand. "I'd feel really bad, sensei. I'm already intruding."

"Shion," Nezumi said with an exasperated sigh, crossing his arms. "I wasn't kidding about dragging you there. I'm serious. If you sleep on the couch, I'll just sleep on the floor."

"Stubborn!" Shion pouted, but sighed in resignation. "Fine, fine. But I'm not happy about it."

"It's a good thing I don't care, then," Nezumi replied, smirking and holding his hand out again. "Hurry up. It's getting late."

"You're such a bad influence," Shion grumbled. Cravat jumped out of his lap with an indignant meow as Shion took Nezumi's hand and stood up. "I don't usually stay up this late."

"Oh, really?" Nezumi said, a hint of sarcasm in his voice as he lead Shion from the main room to the hallway. "I would've thought you were an absolute party animal."

"Ha ha."

Their steps, soft and steady as the two of them made their way down the hard wood floor of the hallway, resonated and echoes, bouncing off the walls in the thin hallway as Nezumi lead him towards his bedroom. Shion was mostly aware of the fact that Nezumi hadn't let go of his hand; that there was very little distance between Nezumi's back and Shion, and Shion felt as though Nezumi could definitely hear his heartbeat, so loud and quick in his chest, echoing around them along with their footsteps. Again, the nature of their situation came flooding back to Shion, and Shion couldn't help but wonder if this was okay for them to do; and, along with that thought, what would he do if there was any possibility that Nezumi felt the same way? That wouldn't be okay, definitely, there was no way for a relationship between a student and a teacher to be okay. But would that stop Shion? Did it even_ matter _to Shion?

'No,' Shion knew the answer. 'No, it wouldn't matter.'

Because Shion hadn't felt this way about anyone in his life before. This wasn't the way he liked Safu, who was immensely precious and important to him; when Safu confessed to him, he felt nothing at all except for shame and sadness. It wasn't as though he meant for Safu to fall in love with him. If he had to put an emotion, a feel to it, he absolutely _hated _that Safu loved him in a romantic way. It made him feel sick to his stomach.

"Something wrong?" Nezumi asked, pulling him out of his thoughts; they had reached Nezumi's bedroom door and Nezumi was looking down at him in concern. Shion shook his head and looked down.

"Just thinking about something that happened today," Shion muttered, and instinctively he tightened his hold on Nezumi's hand. He blushed slightly and looked away; being this close to Nezumi made his heart race, made him feel flustered, in a way that Safu or anyone else never could. And when Nezumi squeezed Shion's hand in response, and gave him a rare and gentle smile, Shion felt like he was so happy he could die.

No one ever, ever made Shion feel that way before.

"Anyway, here's my room. It's nothing much, but still."

Shion walked into the middle of the plain room, and it really wasn't much; the furniture was a dark wooden color that matched the floor and was scarce, just a bed and a dresser and a bookshelf. There was a large window on the far wall that was currently covered by a dark brown curtain, and on the opposite wall there was a door that was cracked open that Shion assumed lead to the bathroom. Shion turned and smiled at Nezumi. "It suits you."

"You mean it's boring," Nezumi retorted, leaning against the door-frame with his arms crossed. Shion shook his head quickly and smiled.

"It's very Nezumi," Shion replied, before covering his mouth in surprise. He hadn't meant to say Nezumi's name. "A-Ah, sorry, sensei-"

"Nezumi... Nezumi's fine," Nezumi murmured, a light pink blush dusted across his cheeks. He scowled up at the ceiling. "A-Anyway, if you need anything, just come and get me, okay?"

"Don't talk to me like I'm a child," Shion pouted again. Nezumi laughed.

"How can I not, when you make a face like that?"

"S-Shut up!"

"Good night, Shion," Nezumi said loudly over Shion's indignant remark. He turned to close the door and Shion stepped forward.

"G-Good night, sensei!" Shion said, smiling. "And thank you."

"Of course."

And the door closed behind Nezumi, and Shion was alone. He made his way over to Nezumi's bed and sunk down on top of it, running his hand across the blanket and biting his lip, blushing. "This is where sensei sleeps..."

He fell back on his back, looking up at the ceiling. "And this is what he sees every night before he falls asleep."

Finally, he threw the blanket over himself and rest his head on the pillow on the left side of the bed, the pillow that was slightly indented and where the blankets were slightly disturbed; the side of the bed where Nezumi slept. He closed his eyes and burrowed down deeper in the bed. "It smells like sensei..."

* * *

_'Shion's in the other room._..'

Nezumi turned on his side, looking directly at the back of the couch, the material of it pressing against his face as he sighed. He couldn't get those thoughts out of his head.

_'Shion's asleep in there._..'

Today, they had interacted in a way that was far more personal than any of the other times that they were together before; they sat next to each other, their arms close together, talking the way friends would. They were _friends_.

_'It's_ _very_ _Nezumi_.'

Shion had said that to him. Why had it made Nezumi so happy when Shion said his first name? It was nothing special, nothing that others didn't say on a daily basis, and yet when Shion said it, blushing and sudden, Nezumi felt an immediate glow in his heart. Why?

'There's never been anyone like Shion,' Nezumi thought to himself, turning so that he was facing the ceiling, laying on his back. One of his cats, the one who had taken quite a liking to Shion, jumped onto the couch and up on his chest. Nezumi raised his hand and scratched the cat behind his ears, earning a soft purr from the cat. Nezumi smiled to himself.

"... Cravat."

* * *

The light was dim; but it was also warm, and it made the room Shion woke up in, a room full of beige-colored blankets and dark wooden furniture, feel cozy and comfortable. It was almost familiar, even, because it felt like Nezumi. Shion yawned and sat up, rubbing his eyes.

"Sensei's room," He murmured quietly to himself, remembering his situation. At least it was Saturday, and they didn't have school that day or the next, so it wasn't as though he particularly needed to be anywhere. How awkward it would have been if he had driven to school with Nezumi. What if someone had seen them? And, even more terrible to think about, what if Safu had seem them? Shion didn't even want to imagine it.

"It's about time you woke up."

Shion jumped in surprise, and turned his startled gaze to the door where Nezumi was standing. "You slept through most of the morning, you know."

Nezumi's hair was down; that was the first thought that Shion processed, the first time he saw Nezumi that morning. He had never seen it like that, cascading down and just barely long enough to brush past his shoulders. Shion realized he was staring and laughed awkwardly.

"I stayed up later than I usually do," Shion defended. He scratched his head. "What time is it?"

"It's a bit past ten."

"That's not _that _late!" Shion informed his teacher, sliding out of the bed and standing up straight, raising his arms and stretching. "Did you sleep okay? I still feel bad about making you sleep on the couch."

"If anything, _I _made me sleep on the couch," Nezumi rolled his eyes and smiled at Shion. "I slept fine. Did you?"

"Yeah~"

Nezumi and Shion looked at each other for a moment; Nezumi taking in Shion's sleep, clumsy appearance and Shion observing Nezumi's always graceful one in a slightly warmer, more familiar light.

"A-Anyway, I made breakfast. Come on."

* * *

"Shion?"

Shion blinked and looked up; Safu was standing over his desk, her arms crossed and a stern expression on her face. "Shion, it's only the first day of the school week, and you're already losing focus!"

"I'm not losing focus!" Shion protested, sitting up straighter in his desk and turning away from the window; though, in all actuality, he really _was _distracted. He just kept thinking about Nezumi, ever since he stayed over his apartment Friday night.

He hadn't left right away the next morning; in fact, Shion stayed and spent time with Nezumi until well into the afternoon. It was really all too easy to forget that Nezumi was his teacher, and that spending so much time with him both inside and outside of school wasn't exactly 'normal' or 'appropriate' by many standards. However, how could he stay away? He still felt so drawn to Nezumi, felt like any moment spent with anyone else, when he _could _be spending it with Nezumi, was an absolute waste.

"Shion! You're doing it again!"

"S-Sorry Safu!" Shion stuttered, smiling apologetically. He was relieved, however, that things hadn't changed between him and Safu at all. He felt a little bit like he was cheating by not acknowledging Safu's confession, but maybe Safu preferred it that way.

"What are you reading now?" Safu asked with a sigh, sinking down in the seat in front of Shion's desk and leaning towards him. "Sherlock... Holmes?"

"I ran out of Shakespeare," Shion admitted, blushing slightly. Safu sighed and shook her head in disbelief.

"You're not even yourself anymore," Safu accused, and smiled when Shion loudly protested; because, really, after all, Shion was exactly the same and would likely never ever change.

* * *

"Nezumi!"

Nezumi stopped walking mid-step, just a few feet from his classroom door, and turned to see Inukashi running after him; it was the end of the school day, and the late afternoon light was flooding into the hallway and turning it an almost surreal, golden light. Nezumi sighed and waited for Inukashi to make it to his side of the hallway.

"Hey, do you want to hang out tonight?" Inukashi asked when he finally reached Nezumi, slightly out of breath.

"Nah, not tonight. I have a lot of grading to do," Nezumi admitted.

"Really?" Inukashi asked, sounding surprised. "Even I finished my grading this weekend. And I'm always the last one."

"I was preoccupied this weekend," Nezumi responded. He raised an eyebrow when Inukashi grinned at him. "What?"

"So you _do_ have someone!" Inukashi accused, pointing at him. "How could you not tell me? Me! Your _best friend_! I mean, seriously, Nezumi, you're such an _ass_-"

"How did you come to that conclusion?" Nezumi asked in an exasperated voice. "It's nothing like that."

"Oh, good," Inukashi said, completely back to normal. Nezumi could swear that Inukashi's easily-influenced mood was giving him emotional whiplash. "I thought maybe you finally got with that kid."

"Kid?" Nezumi was surprised.

"That albino kid," Inukashi elaborated. "I saw you leave with him Friday night."

"That was just because it was raining," Nezumi replied, but he couldn't deny that he was shaken. What if it was a student that saw them and not Inukashi? What if there _was _a student who saw them? "You were still here?"

"I told you I finished my grading, didn't I? I stayed after to finish it up," Inukashi said. He grinned. "You seem flustered."

"Don't be ridiculous," Nezumi said more coldly. He couldn't afford to allow Inukashi to think he had feelings for Shion, even if he _did_. "It was nothing special or important. He's just a kid. It's not like he means anything to me.'

"Thought so," Inukashi sighed. "I was hoping for something more scandalous."

"Like that will ever happen," Nezumi murmured, something like disappointment leaking into his heart. It probably _wouldn't _ever happen, but not because he wasn't willing. He was more than willing to be with Shion. "Never."

"Ah, you're so cold, Nezumi!" Inukashi whimpered, putting a hand over his heart. "Maybe you don't have a heart after all!"

"Maybe so," Nezumi chuckled.

* * *

_'It's nothing special or important.'_

_'He's just a kid.'_

_'Never.'_

_'Like that will ever happen.'_

_'Never.'_

_'Never.'_

_'It's not like he means anything to me.'_

_'Never.'_

Shion was leaning against the door in Nezumi's classroom, having arrived there a few minutes before Nezumi and Inukashi's conversation. He hadn't meant to eavesdrop; in fact, if there was any way to avoid overhearing their conversation, he would have. But the fact of the matter was that they were standing right outside of Nezumi's classroom and Shion could hear them far more clearly than he wanted. He wished he hadn't heard. He didn't think anything could _hurt _this much.

'Of course, I knew it was this way,' Shion thought, straightening up and rubbing his eyes, which had become uncomfortably hot and heavy, with his sleeve. He laughed at himself in his thoughts. 'Of course I'm just a kid. Of course I don't matter to him. Of course he'll never, ever feel the same way. Never, never, never, never...'

'But it still hurts,' Shion clenched his eyes shut, the tears becoming harder and harder to hold back. He slowly walked over to the desk where he placed his bag. Was Nezumi still in the hallway? Maybe he could leave before Nezumi came in. He didn't want Nezumi to see him this way.

And what could have ever come of Shion's feelings, anyway? Nezumi was a teacher, an upperclassmen teacher, and Shion was just a first year, a kid, a student. It didn't matter that Shion had fallen in love with Nezumi, because Nezumi would never see him as anything more than just a clumsy student that always bothered him after school. It didn't matter that Shion loved him so much that sometimes it made his heart hurt. It didn't matter...

"Shion?"

Shion stiffened in surprise, and turned to see Nezumi standing in the doorway. "You're here already?"

"A-Ah, yeah," Shion said, smiling as normally as he could. "B-But I had forgotten about... something that I need to do, s-so..."

"What's wrong?" Nezumi said immediately, sounding concerned. "You're shaking."

"I'm fine! I really need to go, so," Shion clumsily grabbed for his bag and saw that he was, after all, shaking. He clenched his teeth and cursed himself inwardly- could he have acted any weirder if he tried? "I-I..."

"Shion?"

"S-Sorry," Shion said quietly, finally getting hold of his bag and holding it to his chest, looking up at Nezumi and smiling again. Could Nezumi tell that it was fake? "Anyways, I-I'll be coming around less, so you don't have to worry about anything, and-"

"Shion," Nezumi repeated, starting to walk towards Shion, his voice growing more worried.

"I'll try not to bother you anymore, so-"

"Oi!"

Shion pushed past Nezumi, his head bent downwards. He had to leave, he had to leave, he had to leave... "Bye, sensei."

"Shion!"

Shion turned and jumped in surprise when Nezumi slammed his palm against the door of his classroom to prevent Shion from leaving. Shion avoided Nezumi's eyes, pressed against he wall and Nezumi far closer than he wanted him to be right now. He had to leave. He didn't Nezumi to see him like this, and he wanted to leave. "I really have to go, so..."

"Liar," Nezumi said quietly. "Shion, what's wrong?"

"I-It's nothing! It's not like it matters to you, anyway!" Shion finally burst out, shrinking against the door and looking away. "So just let me leave, please."

"What are you talking about?" Nezumi sounded surprised. "Of course it matters to me."

"Now you're the liar," Shion whispered. "It's fine. It's okay. I don't care if it's not special or important-"

"Shion, you didn't-" Nezumi began, realizing in horror that Shion must have overheard some of his conversation with Inukashi. Shion _must _have known that Nezumi was lying to Inukashi!

"A-And that I'm a nuisance-"

"Shion, that's-"

"And that I don't mean anything to you," Shion said more quietly, still averting Nezumi's eyes. "All of that's fine."

"Oh, Shion," Nezumi sighed. "Shion, I didn't mean any of that-"

"Liar," Shion whimpered, clenching his eyes shut. "I don't care if I'm a kid, just be _honest_ with me. You're such a liar, sensei."

"I couldn't be _honest _with Inukashi," Nezumi said, sounding more desperate. There was a true sense or urgency to his words that made Shion look up at him in surprise. "You're not the person I lied to."

Shion bit his lip and looked away again, shaking his head. Nezumi sighed.

"Shion, it's not like I could tell him my honest feelings," Nezumi murmured. "It's not like I could tell him that I.."

"You...?" Shion looked up at him again, daring himself to hope, to give his love one last final chance. Nezumi met his gaze and knew that there was no turning back at this point. "Sensei..."

"Shion..." Nezumi removed his hand from the door and cupped Shion's cheek, brushing an escaped tear away with his thumb. He couldn't look away from Shion's wide, red eyes, shining with tears and maybe just a glimmer of something a little bit different. Nezumi put both of his hands on either side of Shion's face and leaned down, pressing his forehead against Shion's. "Tell me if you want me to stop, Shion."

Shion met Nezumi's gaze and felt his breath fan across his face and knew he would never, ever tell Nezumi to stop. Nezumi gently tilted Shion's head up and leaned closer their lips just mere inches apart; Shion's bag fell from his hand. Shion felt his heart beat loudly in his chest, louder than it had ever been before, and gently allowed his eyes to close in anticipation. Nezumi didn't want to hesitate anymore and found that he couldn't.

He finally pressed his lips against Shion's gently and for only a second, more afraid than an adult should be. He felt dread grow inside of him when Shion stiffened at he contact and drew away just a few inches before Shion moved forward and kissed him again. "Shion..." Nezumi murmured against Shion's lips before Shion drew back, blushing furiously. Shion looked away slightly in embarrassment, but his hands were gripping Nezumi's shirt tightly and Shion didn't move away. They were so close, so close, and Nezumi couldn't help but lean in to kiss him again. He stopped when their lips were just a whisper apart, brushing his thumb against Shion's cheek. "Is this fine with you?"

He wasn't just referring to that kiss in particular, to their close proximity, he was talking about his feelings. Their lips pressed together was Nezumi's unspoken confession, works that he wasn't sure he'd ever be able to say out loud. Nezumi was so unsure of it all, though he knew at this point that his feelings were miraculously, somehow, _somehow _reciprocated. Was Shion okay with this kind of relationship? He searched for the answer in Shion's eyes, and Shion finally met Nezumi's gaze.

"A-Again," Shion finally murmured, clenching Nezumi's shirt tighter in his hands. When he spoke, their lips just barely touched. "It's fine, so... I want you to kiss me again."

And Nezumi could only answer Shion's request by finally kissing him again, wrapping an arm around Shion's waist tightly to pull him closer, his other hand running through Shion's soft white hair, hardly able to hold back his sigh of both relief and happiness, and a little embarrassed that he was so obviously expression his emotion. Shion reached up and wrapped his arms around Nezumi's neck and tilted his head slightly, kissing him back with enthusiasm that Nezumi never expected from someone as timid as Shion. The room was filled with the golden light of an afternoon that was slowly growing older and redder with the passing moments. The sounds of the cars racing past the school, and also their lips moving together, was quiet and everything about the moment was so surreal that Nezumi expected it all to be a dream and to wake up at any second. But it was real, and their lips parted and met again, Shion's shallow breath caressing his cheeks before Nezumi kissed him again. It was clumsy and unpracticed; Nezumi didn't want to move too fast, and this was an entirely new experience for Shion. They were so _close_, and Nezumi felt so _warm_.

"Sensei..." Shion whispered when Nezumi finally pulled back, looking up at him with wide eyes, blushing even deeper than before.

"Sorry," Nezumi said quietly, kissing Shion's forehead gently. Now that they were this close, Nezumi didn't want to add any space between them. "I couldn't hold back anymore."

"I-I don't mind," Shion responded, slightly breathlessly. He tightened his arms around Nezumi's neck. "I don't mind at all..."

Shion buried his face in the crook of Nezumi's neck, a shaky sigh of contentment escaping from his lips. He slid his hands down from around Nezumi's neck and rested them on his chest again, gently gripping Nezumi's shirt in his hands. Nezumi ran his fingers through Shion's hair again before glancing at the clock, frowning slightly at how late it was becoming. Normally, he would want to spend every single moment of the day with Shion, but after his conversation with Inukashi earlier and Safu's suspicions of Shion's feelings for him, he knew it would be a terrible risk to spend a noticeable amount of time together. He pressed his face into Shion's hair. "It's getting kind of late."

"I don't want to go home," Shion's voice came out muffled against Nezumi's skin. Nezumi smiled gently and kissed Shion's hair. He just couldn't stop trying to get closer to him. "But I guess I probably should."

"Mmm," Nezumi hummed, finally pulling back. "I'll see you later."

"Tomorrow," Shion muttered, and Nezumi's arms lingered around him before pulling away completely and walking across the classroom towards his desk. Shion leaned down and picked up his bag that had fallen to the ground. He adjusted the bag on his shoulder and watched Nezumi for a moment before sliding the door open. He took one step past the threshold before saying, "Bye-bye."

Nezumi turned as the door slid closed, leaving the room in silence. Nezumi covered his mouth with his hand, a blush finally creeping up to his cheeks. He leaned against the chalkboard and shakily tried to get hold of his emotions. He was just too _happy _to think clearly at the moment.

"Bye-bye."

* * *

Author's Note:

Finally finally FINALLY, am I right? Anyways, I apologize for the wait! I made this chapter even longer than usual, like, even longer than the last one. Seriously. =3 Anyways, thank you all for reading and reviewing! I write because of the inspiration you guys give me, so thank you so much!


	9. Chapter 9

**I'm terribly, terribly sorry for all of the problems I've been having updating this chapter! I sincerely hope that you all can forgive me, and that you can enjoy this chapter nonetheless! **

* * *

Karin, Shion's mother, had noticed something different about Shion after the past month or so.

He was always cheerful. Well, he was _always_ bouncing around and smiling and complimenting everyone and being optimistic, but this was something different. It was as though his happiness was more genuine; or, maybe not genuine, but definitely stronger and more obvious. It was as though there was an incredible enthusiasm that was bursting from him now, or maybe a better word would be euphoria. No matter how you decided to define it, Shion was definitely elated these days, and Karin was dying with curiosity to figure out what it was that was making him this that his happiness was a _bad_ thing- Karin was absolutely thrilled that Shion was beginning to genuinely enjoy his life. For the longest time, Karin feared that Shion would go through his entire life selflessly loving others and caring for them without a care for his own desires; living his life striving off of his optimistic personality and the sympathy and empathy he felt for everyone he encountered. Karin knew that was no way to live, for that was how she'd been living since she was young, and she knew that once Shion was on his own his life would seem empty. He always needed to care for someone, and once he was in an empty room with no one to take care of, he would truly feel the sting of loneliness.

Which is why Karin suspected that the reason for the change in his personality was love. Not the love he'd been feeling his entire life, obligatory love for all living things, but passionate and strong love. Karin suspected this because of the look in Shion's eyes; the far off look when he got home, and the excitement before he went to school. The only questioned that remained was _who_ caught Shion's eye? It was a very difficult thing to do, after all; Safu, the person closest to Shion, had been pining after him for years, but to no avail. There were also several girls during middle school as well, bashful blushing girls who had left letters in his desk and had confessed to him behind the school. Shion was always regretful and sorrowful after these confrontations, for he hated to turn anyone down and hurt their feelings.

_'I don't want to hurt anyone_,' Shion had told her after he received his first confession. He was sitting on the couch hugging his knees, with an extremely sad look in his eyes. '_But I don't want to be dishonest, either. Lying would be more terrible, wouldn't it? That's what I've convinced myself_.'

Shion was always, always thinking of others. Ever since he was young, he'd been helping and caring about the people around him. Karin remembered that Shion always used to come home late whenever tests were coming up, because he would stay after school and help his classmates with their homework and answering their questions; Shion had always been very smart, and he was very grateful for it, for he could assist people better that way. All of his skills, all of his hobbies, they all walked hand in hand with making the lives of others better. Karin had always wished for Shion to do what _he_ wanted to do, and for a while, it seemed as though even Shion didn't know the things he wanted. Karin was afraid Shion would grow to be a lonely, apathetic adult.

"Shion?"

Karin was leaning in the kitchen doorway, watching Shion pack up his school things for the day. He looked up and tilted his head curiously, smiling at his mother. "What's wrong, Mama?"

"I was just wondering... How has school been lately?" Karin asked, and Shion smile wider.

"It's been great," He replied, snapping his bag closed and standing up, slinging it over his shoulder. He yawned and looked at his watch. "Ah, it's late again."

"It's because you've been staying after so late, lately," Karin said. "Have you been staying after helping your classmates again?"

"I did used to do that, didn't I?" Shion said nostalgically, laughing. "But no, that's not it. I've just been- ah, studying there lately. I liked the environment better."

"I guess it must be lonely here without anyone here to say 'Welcome home!', huh?" Karin said apologetically, but she noticed how Shion hesitated before finishing his sentence. "I've been getting off earlier lately, though, so I'm usually here."

"Really?" Shion said, smiling again. "I'm glad. You can get more rest that way."

"It's nice," Karin agreed, crossing her arms as she leaned against the doorway, smiling. "Have you been studying with Safu?"

"No," Shion replied, shaking his head. "She's the Class Representative now, you know. She has a lot of after school duties."

"So by yourself?" Karin responded, frowning. "I don't like the idea of you being alone."

"Oh, I'm not alone," Shion reassured her. "I'm with se- Er, the other people in the library. It's a busy place, and I go to a popular school."

"Mmm," Karin hummed, grinning. What had he been about to say before he caught himself. "So have you made many friends?"

"Well, there are my classmates. I like them all," Shion told her, setting his bad down on the table and loosening his school tie, with a thoughtful expression on his face. "And there's always Safu."

"But is there anyone you particularly like?"

"I already said, I like my classmates, and-"

"No, no, no!" Karin interrupted. She grinned again and leaned forward slightly. "I mean that you _like_!"

"A-Ah, well," Shion said, blushing brightly when he realized what she meant. "I-I don't have a classmate like that."

"Oh ho ho," Karin tilted her head. "I think you're lying to me. It's the fear of every mother!" She sighed dramatically and hung her head. "My son is going through a difficult phase, he's even lying to his mama! When I was your age, Shion, I-"

"Ah, give me a break," Shion groaned. "I'm being honest, I promise."

But Karin discovered that day that there was someone that Shion loved. She could tell by the look in his eyes before he left for school, by the way he blushed when she inquired, and how a certain name on his cell phone could make him smile so brightly. She didn't know _who_ it was, but that was fine; Shion would definitely tell her when he was ready.

* * *

Safu had noticed something different about Shion after the past thirty days.

For starters, he was starting to stare off into space even more than he usually did. Safu had noticed the gradual deterioration of his concentration and interest in their lessons, and it seemed to have gotten to the point where Shion simply couldn't be bothered to pay attention during class. He often stared out the window, or doodled absentmindedly on the corner of his paper during lectures. Safu, who diligently took notes of even the most obscure and useless things, hadn't bothered to observe Shion during these moments, as she had her own grades to maintain. However, she could only assume it had something to do with that teacher that Shion was always hanging around. He always perked up at the end of the day, sitting up straight as a board and constantly glancing at the clock during their last period of the day. He simply couldn't wait to rush out of the classroom. Safu would watch him helplessly, unable to do anything about it.

She had hoped that, by confessing her love, the two of them could be as close as they used to be. Before their high school years began, the two of them were practically inseparable; they walked to school together, ate lunch together, did their homework together, walked home together, and went out on Sundays. Shion was always so kind to her- well, then again, Shion was kind to _everyone_. Safu wanted him to be hers again, to forget about that troublesome sensei.

She clenched her fists at the thought of it. Why had that person entered their lives so suddenly? They got on just fine without him; the way he seemed uninterested in everything, so full of himself. He had taken Shion away from her, with sweet whispers of sonnets and soliloquies and other pointless things. Shion was completely enamored by it, _obsessed_ with it. Shion cared more for novels than textbooks these days, and it felt like he and Safu had nothing to discuss anymore. Instead of it being a conversation, it was Shion nodding and smiling and humoring her discussions of futures and lessons. Safu realized in horror that he was beginning to treat her the same as everyone else. She knew that it was because she was no longer the most important person to Shion, and it hurt terribly.

"I want to walk home with you again," Safu whispered to herself.

But Shion couldn't hear her, because he had already left. The classroom was empty.

* * *

Inukashi had noticed something different about Nezumi after the past several weeks.

To start with, on occasion, Nezumi was actually _nice_ to him! This was completely out of the ordinary, and it left Inukashi completely dumbfounded. One morning, Nezumi actually _smiled_ at Inukashi and greeted him with a perfectly pleasant "Good morning." This was absolutely unthinkable. Inukashi immediately felt Nezumi's forehead to see if he had a fever, and was reassured that Nezumi was perfectly healthy, because he punched just as hard as usual. But it didn't stop there, oh, no sir- Nezumi would actually be _patient_ with him. Like, Nezumi would listen to his stories, actually _listen_, all the way through, rather than ignore him the way he usually did. Nezumi would even humor him by commenting on his stories and laughing at his disgustingly poor attempts at humor. It actually made Inukashi tear up a bit, but he learned to never try and hug Nezumi and have a nice bonding moment, because then Nezumi would turn not-nice again and punch him really hard. So Inukashi just tried to savor the uncharacteristic, nice Nezumi, and didn't really dwell on the cause.

"And, Nezumi, get this, Nezumi... I ate the WHOLE thing!"

"Good for you, Inukashi," Nezumi replied, looking up from the stack of papers in front of him just long enough to smile before returning to his task, crossing out an answer on a test and scribbling in the correct answer in red pencil.

"Mm.. Nezumi, will you grade my tests, too?" Inukashi asked hopefully, sinking down in front of Nezumi's desk on his knees with his arms folded on the surface. "I kind of hate grading shit."

"No chance, but thank you for the offer," Nezumi said sarcastically. Inukashi couldn't believe it; usually, Nezumi would have glared at him and tried to kill him with his checking pencil. "If you hate grading, then why did you become a teacher?"

"Because I get summer, winter, and spring breaks this way!" Inukashi declared. "Isn't that why everyone does it?"

"We still work during those."

"Not as much! But, hey, you know that in Western schools they get _all_ summer off?!"

"I did know that, actually," Nezumi informed him, laughing when Inukashi visibly deflated in disappointment. "I don't think I'd prefer that, though."

"Ehhh?! Why not?!"

"Don't you think that would get boring?"

"Not at all!" Inukashi insisted. "Though it'd be even harder to return after a break and all."

"Mmm," Nezumi hummed in agreement. Inukashi opened his mouth to start another conversation- he couldn't remember what it was, but it was probably something stupid and entirely irrelevant and unimportant- but just as he began to speak, the door to the classroom slid open. "Shion!"

"Oh, hello, sensei!" It was that white-haired kid with the weird eyes. He noticed Inukashi and smiled at him, bowing in greeting. "It's been a while."

"Oh, it's the albino kid! He still comes around here, huh?" Inukashi said, standing up and approaching him.

"Al...bino?" Shion repeated, tilting his head curiously. "No, my name is Shion."

"I know that, dumb ass," Inukashi grumbled, flicking his forehead. Shion pouted and rubbed his forehead, making Inukashi grin. This kid was actually pretty cute. "Nezumi hasn't started to piss you off yet? I'm surprised you're not sick of his abusive tendencies."

"Abusive tendencies?" Shion asked, before laughing. "Sensei's very kind."

"Well he has been lately, actually," Inukashi said thoughtfully. "He's been in an unsettling good mood lately, now that you mention it, for the past month or so. At first I thought he had a fever, but I guess a cold wouldn't last this long."

"Is that so?" Shion said, smiling widely at Nezumi, as though laughing at some unspoken joke, and Inukashi wondered why Nezumi's cheeks seemed to grow red when he met Shion's gaze before looking away, scowling.

"Shut up, Inukashi," Nezumi grumbled, and Shion laughed again, making Nezumi's appear to blush more. Of course, Nezumi didn't have kindness or human emotions, so of course he didn't _actually_ blush. Inukashi supposed it was the lighting. "Anyway, Inukashi. Don't you have to go home and let your dogs out?"

"Aaah you're right!" Inukashi exclaimed. He raced out of the room, ruffling Shion's hair as he passed by and slamming the door closed behind him.

Returning to his classroom, his mind was completely set on the task ahead of him; getting home, letting out the dogs, grading the papers he'd been putting off for a few months, decide it was a waste of time and then go out drinking until the wee hours of the morning and promptly fall asleep on his couch just before his alarm went off to wake him up. Yes, that seemed like a fine plan!

"If my damn... bike... would... start!" Inukashi growled, trying again and again to start his motorcycle, but to no avail. "Damn it!"

He kicked the useless thing, which probably didn't help with the whole always-breaking-his-motorcycle thing, and stalked back inside, his helmet under his arm. He really needed to get that thing fixed by a professional; usually, he just sort of slapped some duct tape onto it and hoped for the best, and it actually kept it from falling apart for a few weeks, but it would always break again. Maybe he should start to commute like commoners did, like walking and taking the bus, but he knew that he'd never be able to wake up early enough to take the bus and walking seemed like such an insufferable hassle.

So he decided to do what any wise man would do; pester Nezumi until the bastard consented to giving him a ride home.

"Hey, Nezumi, I- WHOAH."

He _really_ should have knocked.

Shion was sitting on top of Nezumi's desk, the papers pushed hastily aside and skewed across the desk, his fingers tangled in Nezumi's hair and his legs around Nezumi's waist. Nezumi had a hand on the desk in order to support himself, his other arm around Shion's neck. The two of them were _kissing_. Inukashi wondered if it was the lighting again, and shook his head vigorously- when he opened his eyes again, they were _still_ tangled together, though the two of them were now staring at him.

"Well damn," Nezumi sighed, only appearing slightly and indifferently disgruntled by being caught. Shion, on the other hand, was blushing furiously, and tried to pull away from Nezumi in embarrassment. Nezumi, however, wouldn't have that, and wrapped his arms around Shion's waist in a vice-like grip, holding him closer. "Don't you know how to knock, Inukashi?"

"You don't knock on classroom doors," Inukashi managed to stutter out, though he was still in complete shock at the scene before him. He looked back and forth between the two of them. "You two... uh, you're... like, um..._ really_ close, aren't you?"

"I told you we shouldn't do this in school, sensei," Shion managed to murmur, firmly pushing Nezumi away and sliding off the desk, taking several steps away and avoiding the gaze of both teachers, still blushing violently. "S-Sorry."

"Yeah, you really shouldn't do that in school," Inukashi agreed. "I mean, what if someone else had walked in? You'd be fucked."

"Wait... so you don't think there's anything wrong with it?" Nezumi asked in surprised.

"Hmm? Wrong with what?" Inukashi asked dumbly.

"Shion and I. Being together," Nezumi clarified, he glanced at Shion, and when their gazes met he couldn't help but smile softly at the tentative and nervous smile Shion offered him. "He's a male, and a student."

"Sooooo...?" Inukashi drew out, wondering what Nezumi was asking him.

"So you think that's fine?" Nezumi asked. "No one else would ever accept a relationship like that."

"Well, as you always say to me, 'I'm something else'!" Inukashi said proudly- he had never realized that Nezumi always meant that as an insult. He couldn't help but smile when Shion hesitantly walked back over to Nezumi, shyly taking his hand and twining their fingers together, leaning against Nezumi's arm. "Besides, you're happy, right? I've never seen you this happy in all the years we've known each other."

"Thank you," Shion spoke up, his words entirely sincere. He smiled gently and genuinely, gripping Nezumi's hand slightly tighter in his; Nezumi smiled down at him. "Thank you so much, sensei."

"I'll definitely keep it a secret!" Inukashi swore, pounding his fist to his chest with a determined look in his eyes. "Fight!"

"Fight!" Shion mimicked enthusiastically, throwing his fist into the air. Nezumi rolled his eyes sarcastically. But why had Inukashi returned in the first place? Nezumi watched the two of them interact curiously, pondering the question.

"Ah, yes, you have fighting spirit!" Inukashi told Shion in a deep voice. Shion straightened up and saluted Inukashi.

"Thank you, Commander Sensei!"

"That's Major Commander Sensei!"

"Yes, Major Commander Sensei!"

"Inukashi, why-"

"Major Commander Sensei!" Inukashi corrected Nezumi, pointing at him almost violently.

"No way in hell," Nezumi said coolly, and Inukashi sighed dramatically. "Anyway, why did you come back?"

"Why did I... Oh! Yeah, my bike broke again. I need a ride home," Inukashi told him, remembering his original dilemma.

"I'm not driving you home."

"Ah, so cruel," Inukashi whimpered, sinking to the ground.

"You're such a dumb ass."

"Shion! Tell your boyfriend to stop being so mean to me!"

"I-I don't think I can do that..." Shion stuttered.

So, that day, Inukashi discovered that Nezumi actually _did_ have human emotions, and liked to take part in sexual activities with a minor, who was so clueless that he probably didn't even realize that he was in a romantic relationship in the first place. The fact that it was illegal for them to be together didn't cross Inukashi's mind until he was drunk later that night, and even then the thought was promptly forgotten.

* * *

"Sensei?"

Nezumi looked up from the book he was reading, and saw Shion enter his classroom tentatively, clutching his bag nervously in his hands. Nezumi shook his head in answer to Shion's question, holding back his laughter when Shion looked visibly relieved, sighing. Shion closed the door behind him and made his was towards the desk directly across from Nezumi's, the one he'd been using for months now, and placed his bag on the desk, pulling out his textbook. "He's been coming around a lot lately, hasn't he?"

"He's so annoying," Nezumi sighed, standing up stretching, closing his book and placing it on the desk. "It's like he never has anything to do."

"I think he's funny," Shion said, turning around and smiling Nezumi, who walked around his desk and made his way towards Shion. "He says some fantastical things."

"You can call him a dumb ass, you know," Nezumi informed him. "I always so."

"You're so mean, sensei," Shion laughed.

Nezumi hummed noncommittally and wrapped his arms around Shion, pulling him against him and resting his chin on top of Shion's head. "You're so short, Shion."

"It's not like I can help it," Shion grumbled, blushing slightly at their contact. He reached up to wind his arms around Nezumi's neck and return his embrace. Shion smiled to himself when Nezumi began running his fingers through his hair. "Still, I'm glad that Inukashi-sensei knows. About us, I mean."

"Why's that?" Nezumi asked, slightly surprised.

"It felt like too big of a thing to keep to myself," Shion replied. He tilted his head up to kiss Nezumi's jaw, smiling lovingly. "I'm just too happy."

"You put Shakespeare to shame," Nezumi teased sarcastically. But he leaned down to kiss Shion softly. "I understand. I'm happy, too."

"Good," Shion smiled, standing on his toes to kiss Nezumi again.

"That never gets old," Nezumi murmured, taking Shion more tightly into his arms and kissing him back enthusiastically, keeping mind to keep his back to the door. If Inukashi interrupted them again, Nezumi would definitely kill him.

* * *

Author's Note:

NEXT CHAPTER- You guys get to experience the awkwardness and wonder that is Nezu-chan and Shion's first date. Oh ho ho. =3


	10. Chapter 10

"I think you're being too harsh with him," Shion said, trying to balance the phone more steadily between his cheek and shoulder. He was attempting to talk to Nezumi on the phone and simultaneously cook dinner for both himself and his mother. "He's a teacher, isn't he? He can't be _that_ stupid."

"_He's still passed out on my couch_," Nezumi responded with a sigh; there was a sound that sounded vaguely like someone being kicked in the side, and Shion winced. "_It's already almost five. I'm sick of having him here... Oi, go home!_"

"Don't be mean, sensei," Shion laughed, smiling to himself and leaning against the counter. "It's not very attractive."

"_I'm _very_ attractive, and you know it_," was Nezumi's narcissistic reply, and Shion laughed again. "_No, Inukashi, I wasn't talking to you. I was talking to Shion... No, you dumbass, Shion's not here... I'm not in _your_ apartment, you're in_ my_ apartment... What the hell is wrong with you_?"

"Sounds like you have your hands full," Shion commented.

"_Why don't you come take care of him for me_?" Nezumi asked, his voice sounding hopeful. "_You just have to feed him and take him outside for a little bit_."

"Of course," Shion agreed, smiling again and holding back his laughter. "Don't I have to lock him up in his cage, too?"

"_Yeah, if you don't do that then he'll tear up the furniture_," Nezumi said, and Shion could hear the smile in his voice. Shion heard Inukashi's unintelligible mumbling in the background again. "_No I'm not talking about the cats, Inukashi, I'm talking about... Get out_."

"How did he even end up at your place, anyway?" Shion asked curiously.

"_He just wandered here late last night, totally wasted_," Nezumi replied. "_It happens sometimes._"

"Oh, my." Shion heard the sound of Nezumi kicking Inukashi again.

"_Anyway, Shion_," Nezumi began. "_Do you have anything planned for tomorrow?_"

"Tomorrow?" Shion asked, tilting his head as he considered the question. "I don't think so, I was just going to study. Why do you ask?"

"_I just thought it was an appropriate question to ask since we're dating,_" Nezumi replied. _"I also had the suspicion that all you do with your spare time is study and read, and I now know that I was correct_."

"I always think it's silly when you or Inukashi-sensei say that we're dating," Shion commented.

"_Why's that?_"

"Because we're really not," Shion explained.

"_Actually, I'm pretty sure we are. That's what the kissing and stuff means_."

"I _mean_ we've never gone on a date," Shion specified, rolling his eyes, though the gesture was wasted since he was still standing alone in his kitchen. Shion's neck was beginning to get sore from his position with the phone between his cheek and shoulder and switched shoulders. He returned his attention to the meal he was making, it having slipped from his mind entirely. "So, technically, we're not dating."

"_Don't think about everything so technically_," Nezumi grumbled. "_What? Inukashi, no, stop eavesdropping. Go into the other room_."

Shion heard Inukashi get kicked again.

"_Anyway_," Nezumi said after another moment. "_Why don't we go out on a date, then?_"

"Eh?" Shion said in surprise, feeling the blood rush to his cheeks. He had never actually considered the idea of him and Nezumi on a date.

"_You said you're not doing anything tomorrow, right? So let's go on a date_."

"I-Is that fine?" Shion asked, frowning slightly. "For us to be together in public? What if someone from school sees us?"

"_Ah, good point_," Nezumi said. "_Well, I'll think of something. We'll make it work. So do you want to?_"

"Yes!" Shion said immediately. "I want to go on a date with you!"

* * *

"_Yes! I want to go on a date with you_!"

'You state things so bluntly,' Nezumi thought, fighting the blush that was threatening to color his cheeks. "S-So I'll pick you up tomorrow, then. At ten. So you'd better be awake, or I'm going without you."

"_It's not a date with one person_," Shion pointed out, and Nezumi laughed.

"I guess you have a point."

"_But I'll be ready by then, so wait for me, okay?_"

"Of course."

"_Great_," Shion replied enthusiastically, and Nezumi could hear the excited smile in his voice. "_Ah, but make sure Inukashi goes home by then. I don't really want him to come_."

"He'll be gone in the next five minutes," Nezumi said, and aimed another kicked for Inukashi's side; Inukashi was laying on the floor next to the couch, mumbling about Nezumi's rotten attitude and that he should learn to value a friend more.

"Ouch! Dammit, Nezumi!" Inukashi growled, returning Nezumi's blow with his own, poorly aimed kick, which accidentally hit one of Nezumi's cats. The cat meowed loudly and started clawing at Inukashi mercilessly, screeching all the while.

"_What's going on?_" Shion asked in surprise; the commotion was loud enough that Shion could hear it through the phone.

"Nothing, nothing at all," Nezumi said innocently, placing the phone between his cheek and his shoulder so he could pull the cat away from Inukashi. "Cravat, stop that. Inukashi, stop antagonizing my cats."

"I don't even know what that word meeeans," Inukashi groaned, rolling over on the floor. Nezumi hoped that he died.

"_You called him 'Cravat_'," Shion said, and Nezumi could just tell that Shion had a smug expression on his face. "_Names _are_ important, after all, huh_?"

"It's just a habit now," Nezumi defended.

"_Well? Did you name the other ones, too?_"

"Well, kind of," Nezumi admitted. "The black one. I've been calling him Tsukiyo."

"_Tsukiyo?_" Shion repeated. He laughed. "_That's cute_."

"It's a better name than 'Cravat'! That's just a pastry. Not all that creative," Nezumi teased, though he had to admit that he thought Shion's thought process was adorable.

"_I've never been creative_," Shion said indignantly. "_I'm a science student._"

"The fact that someone as airheaded and clueless as you can actually be intelligent still surprises me," Nezumi said brightly, because teasing Shion was always too much fun to resist.

"_Shut up_!"

"Oh my God, Nezumi," Inukashi whined, his voice muffled by the floor, as he was still laying face down on the floor of Nezumi's apartment. "Stop flirting with your boyfriend and heeelp me."

"No one can ever help you, Inukashi," Nezumi said solemnly. Shion laughed again, and the sound of it always made Nezumi smile.

"_You're so mean, sense- Ah, the rice_!" Nezumi heard the sound of a pot boiling over and sizzling water. "_Aw, damn..._"

"You're cooking?" Nezumi asked, slightly surprised.

"_Mm. I often cook for mama and myself,_" Shion explained, and Nezumi could hear him move pots around and the sound of plates being set down. "_You know, since she works a lot. On Saturdays I make dinner_."

"You'll make such a good wife."

"_Shut up! If anyone's the wife, it's you. Your hair's so long and girlie_," Shion retorted, and Nezumi made an irritated face. "_Ah, are you making your upset face?_"

"My hair is _not_ girlie. If anything, it's super manly," Nezumi defended.

"It's girlie," Inukashi offered from the ground. Nezumi kicked him again. "Ow, Nezumi!"

"_Oh! Welcome home, Mama!_" Nezumi heard Shion call to someone in the background.

"I'll let you eat dinner," Nezumi said. "I'll see you tomorrow, then."

"_Okay!_" Shion said cheerfully. "_See you tomorrow!_"

"Nezumi, you should've seen your face," Inukashi said after Nezumi hung up, grinning at him upsidedown from the floor. "You're like a little school girl in love."

"Get the hell out of my apartment."

* * *

Shion considered himself to be a very intelligent individual, modesty aside. He was very skilled at discovering, verifying and solving problems with speed and accuracy. Ever since he was young, he'd always been good at practical sciences and math problems; he could identify the problem and he could almost immediately think of an answer. He was just /good/ at it, something that had always baffled his teachers and fellow students. He was simply an incredibly intelligent person.

He could now, however, for the life of him find a way to prepare for his date.

This was something that was completely new to him; he was hesitant to admit it, but he'd received his fair share of confessions in his time, but he had never accept one, let alone gone as far as to date someone. Nezumi really was the first person that Shion had ever had this kind of relationship with, so he had no idea what to expect. Was he supposed to act the way he always did? Was he supposed to act more romantic, more intimate? Was he supposed to act like it was no big deal, even though it most certainly was? He was freaking out about it, _anxious_ about it, and he felt sick to his stomach. Nezumi had certainly been on tons of dates before, and had definitely been with many other people; after all, Nezumi was an interesting, attractive adult. Nezumi probably had high expectations and thought this date would be like all of the others that he had been on in the past. Shion was terrified of disappointing Nezumi.

He wished he could ask Safu for her advice; if not for her confession, then he definitely would have called her right away and begged her for her input. However, he definitely couldn't do that now, after knowing about her feelings for him. He couldn't ask his mother, either; he wouldn't have asked her anyway, but he wasn't sure what she would think of him being in a relationship with another man, let alone his teacher. So he was doomed to deal with his anxiety, but also excitement, all on his own. He tried telling himself that it really wouldn't be any different than hanging out with Nezumi on a regular basis; they already sat close to each other, kissed, and spent time together. Just because a 'date' was labeled as such, would that really make it any different? He tried to tell himself that it wasn't any different at all, though he was still uneasy about it.

"Shion, why are you so antsy?" Karan asked him in surprise over breakfast. She would be gone before Shion would leave for his date with Nezumi, which Shion was actually disappointed about; he wanted something to distract him from the butterflies in his stomach.

"I'm going out with a friend," Shion said, not untruthfully. He was, indeed, going out with a friend- he saw no reason to mention that by 'going out' he meant 'going out on a date', and that this 'friend' just happened to be the man he was hopelessly in love with. She didn't need to know that. "It's been a while before I hung out with someone other than Safu."

"Ah, is that so?" Something in his mother's voice made Shion think she didn't entirely believe him. "Just be yourself! That's the best you can possibly be."

Shion wasn't so sure about that- how could he be himself when he was so nervous? But he was grateful; the most he could do was act the way he felt, and that was so happy to be with Nezumi. So all he could do was smile and be next to him, the way he always did.

But still, when he got into Nezumi's car a few hours later, his heart was beating more quickly and anxiously than it ever had before in his life.

"Good morning," Nezumi said, and grinned teasingly. "I'm surprised you're actually awake."

"That's because I couldn't sleep," Shion grumbled without thinking; blushing furiously when he realized what he said, he crossed his arms indignantly and looked away. "I can wake up like any normal person!"

"Sure, sure," Nezumi replied in a teasingly patronizing tone, reaching over to ruffle Shion's hair. Even that simple touch sent jolts of electricity through Shion's body.

"W-Were you able to get Inukashi out of your apartment?" Shion asked as Nezumi started driving, searching for a topic to talk about; he knew that if a silence were to arise, then he'd have no idea how to break it. It was important that Shion could keep himself distracted from the fact that he was on a date- an actual _date_- with Nezumi.

"Oh, yeah," Nezumi said, nodding. "It took forever, though. I had to actually drag him out the door."

"He's so funny," Shion laughed, imagining the scene as Nezumi described it. "It seems like the two of you are really good friends."

"If I had to be honest, then I guess we are," Nezumi admitted. "We were friends in high school, and we ended up separating once we went to college. It was a coincidence that the two of us ended up teaching, let alone teach at the same place."

"It must've been a nice coincidence," Shion said, and Nezumi nodded, smiling.

"I guess so. He's still pretty difficult to deal with," Nezumi replied, shrugging. He glanced over at Shion. "So where do you want to go?"

"E-Eh?" Shion sat up straighter in surprise.

"This is a date," Nezumi reminded him, laughing at Shion's reaction. "So where do you want to go, what do you want to do?"

"I don't know," Shion admitted, sinking down lower in the car seat. "I don't know what I'm supposed to do. This is new to me."

"Really? Well, I can't say I'm actually surprised," Nezumi said, laughing at Shion's indignant expression in response to his words. "You know what I mean. A date isn't anything to get nervous about, Shion. It's not different from how we usually are when we're together."

"It's a little different," Shion protested. "It feels different."

"I guess so," Nezumi agreed. He looked over at Shion again and smiled gently. "I'm a little nervous, too. I'm happy to be with you."

"Y-Yeah," Shion smiled in return, feeling warm and calm again once Nezumi said those words. Suddenly, Shion had the overwhelming desire to kiss him, and he had to turn away and look out the window with a blush flooding his cheeks; it wasn't as though he could kiss Nezumi while he was driving.

"Well, you have a while to decide," Nezumi said. "We have to go somewhere kind of far away, after all."

"I'd hate to run into someone from school," Shion agreed, nodding. "Hey, sensei."

"Mm?"

"Where did you go to university?" Shion asked curiously. "Sometimes I feel like I don't know you as well as I should."

"I went to a university in Tokyo," Nezumi told him. "Tama[1], if you've heard of it. I went to the high school as you."

"You went to high school here?" Shion asked, surprised. He smiled and laughed. "That makes me happy, for some reason."

Nezumi smiled at him. "Do you have any idea what university you want to go to?"

"None at all," Shion admitted, rubbing the back of his head sheepishly. "I want to stay close by, though."

"Why?" Nezumi asked in a surprised tone. "You could go anywhere you wanted, probably with a full scholarship. Why would you limit yourself?"

"There are lots of reasons," Shion said reluctantly, wanting to avoid the topic. He didn't want to tell Nezumi that he wanted to stay close by so that he could stay close to Nezumi; Nezumi would definitely think that it was childish and stupid, but Shion didn't care. Nezumi had affected his life and brightened up his world like nothing ever had before, and there was no way that he was going to leave something precious like that. "I know that Safu wants to go somewhere in America."

"They've got good schools in America," Nezumi said, nodding in agreement. "Is she inhumanly smart like you?"

"It's not inhuman," Shion sniffed, pouting. "But yes, yes she is. We grew up together and we'd always study together. Actually, we probably studied far more than we needed to."

"That would explain why you're freakishly smart," Nezumi replied. "Seriously, your teachers complain about how smart you and Safu are all the time in the Faculty Room."

"You actually go to the Faculty Room?"

"Of course, I'm a teacher."

"I just thought that you spent all of your time fooling around with your students," Shion said innocently, laughing when Nezumi shot him a joking glare.

"I don't fool around with my students," Nezumi said tersely. "You just happen to be an exception."

Shion noticed that the scenery outside of the windows was unfamiliar now; the buildings here were much closer together, and they were so tall that they sometimes obscured the sunlight. The road, too, was dark, and everything seemed crowded. Shion wasn't used to being in such a crowded city; he had spent his life growing up in a more rural area. "I grew up here."

"Eh?" Shion looked at Nezumi, who kept his eyes on the road.

"Until I started high school, I lived here," Nezumi continued. "Bleak, isn't it?"

"You can't see the sunlight," Shion responded, looking out the window again. "And there aren't any trees."

"I'd always wanted to go somewhere where there were trees," Nezumi admitted. "That's why I took the entrance exam for our high school- I didn't want to stay here anymore."

"So your family moved?" Shion asked, and Nezumi expressed a kind of sad half-smile in response.

"_I_ moved," Nezumi clarified. "I've been living on my own since I was fifteen. Your age, I guess."

"Wow," Shion said in wonder. He couldn't imagine living all by himself; even if his mother was rarely home, she was still there, and it felt a little warmer knowing that someone else lived there with him. "Were you lonely?"

"Not really," Nezumi said, in a way that made Shion sure that he was lying. But he could tell that Nezumi didn't want to discuss it, so he dropped it. Besides, now that Shion was with him, Shion was positive that he would definitely make sure that Nezumi would never feel alone again.

* * *

In the end, Shion wanted to walk through the city with Nezumi. He wasn't really attracted to the idea of a movie, or eating in a nice restaurant or shopping together or anything that couples normally did. Shion decided that since he and Nezumi could hardly qualify as a 'normal' couple, then it was fine if their first date wasn't the same as most. Besides, if the two of them were walking, and since this was a place where no one knew either of them, then the two of them could hold hands as they walked. The moment the two of them began walking, after parking Nezumi's car and taking their first steps along the sidewalk, Shion tentatively reached for Nezumi's hand, hesitantly wrapping his fingers around Nezumi's. Nezumi looked down at Shion, who was blushing furiously, in surprise, before smiling gently and twining his fingers with Shion's. Shion gripped Nezumi's hand tightly and stayed close to his side. Winter was beginning by that time of the year, and Shion pulled his scarf up over his mouth to try and shield his face from the cold, puffs of his white breath escaping from between layers of the fabric. Nezumi's fingers were cold when they twined together with his, so he tightened his hand that was clutching Nezumi's so closely and tried to will his warmth into Nezumi's hand. Shion was so close to Nezumi that their arms were pressed together, and Shion could feel Nezumi's warmth through his jacket. He didn't feel cold anymore, after minutes of walking with him. It was different, walking with Nezumi. There were people all around them, and the stores were loud and bustling around them, but the world seemed quiet. Nezumi pointed out certain buildings that he remembered, and Shion chattered excitedly. Shion was once again astounded by how natural it was to be with Nezumi; talking with him was as easy as breathing, his words an inhale and Nezumi's laughter an exhale.

"I guess it doesn't matter that you can't see the sun here," Shion said after a period of time, pulling his scarf a little higher over his mouth and looking up at the sky. "It's getting so cloudy and dark."

"Maybe it'll snow," Nezumi replied. Shion tightened his hand around Nezumi's and glanced up at the sky again.

"Maybe it'll snow so much there wont be school tomorrow," Shion suggested. Nezumi laughed.

"Inukashi would love that," Nezumi said. "I'm willing to bet that he hasn't graded anything all weekend."

"Have you?" Shion asked.

"I graded everything yesterday," Nezumi replied, grinning. "Inukashi could've done the same, if he wasn't passed out on my couch."

"With Cravat," Shion smiled in return, slightly smugly. "And Tsukiyo. You'll have to name the other one, too."

"I can't think of anything for him."

"Then I'll name him," Shion decided, nodding. "Definitely."

"It better be a good one, then," Nezumi teased, before stopping in front of an older, towering building. Shion looked up at Nezumi, who was apparently lost in thought after seeing the building, and then looked up at the building in question; unlike most of the buildings in that city, there were sections of it where the bricks were covered with ivy, crawling up towards the roof but not quite reaching it. It wasn't quite as tall as the skyscrapers here, but there were stone steps that lead up to the entrance, setting it's doorway above most others. It seemed impressive.

"What's this place?" Shion asked, and he seemed to break Nezumi away from whatever thought enticed by the sight of the building; Nezumi blinked and looked down at him before looking back at the building.

"It was a theater," Nezumi replied, tilting his head as he appraised the structure. "It looks so abandoned."

"It's closed," Shion said, pointing at the entrance. On the two impressive, wooden double doors that served as the entrance to the theater was a large sign that said "CLOSED". "It must've been that way for a while."

"Yeah..."

There was a sad, almost wistful look in Nezumi's eyes that made Shion's heart ache in a terrible way. Shion looked up at the building for a moment longer before glancing down the alleyway along side the building; this city, that had so many dark corners and that never felt the sunlight, was where Nezumi grew up. This was where Nezumi laughed, cried, loved, and watched plays at the theater. It was a place that Shion wanted to experience in it's entirety, as to more fully understand this person who had grown to be so precious to him. His breath spilled out in billows of white smoke as he breathed the wintry air. He only allowed himself to think for a moment, of consequences and reasons why not, before tugging on Nezumi's hand and starting to climb the stairs leading to the building. "Shion?"

"Let's go inside," Shion suggested, turning and taking Nezumi's hand in both of his, walking backwards up the stairs as he pulled Nezumi along. Nezumi gave him a confused look, but complied after a moment.

"Why?" Nezumi questioned.

"It seems important to you," Shion explained. He continued tugging Nezumi along behind him, reaching for the handle of the doorway. "I hope it's not locked."

"It probably is, so-"

"Not," Shion said in a sing-song voice, pulling the door open and smiling cheekily at Nezumi. "After you~"

"You're such a brat," Nezumi grumbled, though his tone was teasing, and he ruffled Shion's hair as he walked by. Shion eagerly followed behind him, and the door shut loudly behind them.

* * *

The air didn't feel like Nezumi remembered.

He had vivid memories of the feeling of this place, this theater that was now empty; he would sneak out on so many Friday nights and go to shows, shows that he had seem before and shows that he'd never heard of before. It was here the he fell in love with Shakespeare, with the music of his words, and when he knew that this dirty city couldn't ever offer him anything. It was here that he memorized lines of plays, where he found himself whispering the lines to himself as they were pronounced on stage, where he was intoxicated by the scent of scripts, and also the scent of the leather of the seats and the almost sweet smell of the wooden walls. In this place, he had loved something for the first time in his life; he loved the worlds created by other people, and the scents that they imagined.

However, it looked the same; the walls were the rich, dark wooden color like they were in his memories, and the carpet was a plush, scarlet red. They were standing in the entrance hall, where the hallways branched off into the stage, the dressing rooms, and where the audience sat. Shion ran his fingers along the walls and looked at the paintings that adorned the walls. It was dark in here; the only light came from where it spilled in from under the doorway.

"It smells like stories," Shion said absentmindedly, slowly turning in place as he looked up at the ceiling, at the paintings, at the dark mahogany walls. Nezumi smiled to himself; how could Shion so accurately describe his thoughts in so few words? "Doesn't it, sensei?"

"Yeah," Nezumi replied, walking towards him again. He put his hand on the small of Shion's back and started walking towards the stage with Shion walking beside him. "This way."

"You remember it?"

"I do," Nezumi murmured; he spoke in a low voice that would have never been heard in the past in this place. However, in the emptiness and silence, his words echoed. It was such a lonely feeling. "I remember it."

And he did, he remembered it so well. Together, they walked into the large room, where the ceiling was high and adorned with a magnificent chandelier, and all of the seats were of brown leather, the carpet scarlet and the walls golden. It left Nezumi breathless, because he remembered it so vividly at that moment; it was almost as though he was a middle-school student again, sitting in the very front row as he stared up at the actors in awe. He could almost hear their voices again, loud and confident and full of so much emotion that it sometimes brought tears to Nezumi's eyes. Those stories, the ones that he could remember so well, were echoing in his head and mixing together. It was almost scary; he longed to experience those things again, to feel the same feeling of wonder that he felt at that time. He slowly made his way to the front row of seats and sunk down into one of them, feeling the familiar sensation of the cool leather as he ran his hand against the top of the seat. He breathed in deeply and waited a few moments before exhaling again.

Suddenly, the light on the stage turned on and nearly blinded him; he blinked and looked up at the stage. Shion walked to the center of the stage, grinning. "I found the light switch, sensei!"

"I can see that," Nezumi replied, grinning. Shion stood up straight and cleared his throat.

"Thank you, thank you all for coming today," Shion said seriously and with an air of egoism. He bowed with flourish. "Today's show will be a magnificent one, indeed."

"I can hardly wait," Nezumi teased, and Shion looked up at him, still low in his bow, grinning. "What will I have to honor of viewing today?"

"A fine question, sir!" Shion said loudly as he stood up. "I have no idea!"

"You're terrible at this," Nezumi said. "You should be fired."

"Ah, what a rude audience member," Shion sighed, dramatically putting his hands over his heart. "Did you hear that? That was the sound of my heart breaking."

"This definitely wasn't worth the entrance fee," Nezumi said teasingly, and Shion stuck his tongue out at him. "Romeo and Juliet. Go."

"_Two households, both alike in dignity_," Shion began, standing up straight and projecting in a dramatic stage voice. "_In fair Verona, where we lay our scene, from ancient grudge break to new mutiny, here civil blood makes civil hands unclean. From... forth_... um..." Shion trailed off, tapping his chin as he tried to remember the next line.

"_From forth the fatal loins of these two foes_," Nezumi announced, smiling a half-smile as he recited from memory. "_A pair of star-cross'd lovers take their life; whole misadventured piteous overthrows do with their death bury their parents' strife_."

"I feel like you have every Shakespeare play memorized, sensei," Shion said, laughing. He tilted his head curiously. "Did you ever want to be an actor?"

"Hmm?" Nezumi considered the question before shaking his head. "No, I don't think so."

"Oh, that's good," Shion said, nodding. Nezumi laughed.

"Why is that good?" Nezumi questioned curiously.

"Because I'd never want for you to be like anyone other than Nezumi," Shion said matter-of-factly, smiling brightly. Nezumi felt his heart pound in his chest at those words; the blunt way Shion said them, the honesty, and how naturally Nezumi's name flowed off Shion's tongue. Shion had never called him by his first name before, and though he only did indirectly, it made Nezumi feel warm. Looking up at the stage where Shion was standing alone in the center, the light shining down on him as he observed the impressive room they were in; he was illuminated in a way that Nezumi had never seen before, smiling so brightly. Nezumi smiled to himself again as he rose up from his seat, slowly making his way towards the stairs on the side of the platform that lead up to the stage.

Shion was observing a piano on the far side of the stage, tentatively tapping keys and jumping slightly at their loud and abrupt sound. Nezumi walked over to him and ran his fingers over the top of the grand piano, feeling it's familiar surface.

"I never learned to play the piano," Shion told him as he approached, lightly tapping the keys. "Safu can play it really well. My mama can, too."

"Never interested?" Nezumi asked, standing behind him. He wrapped his arms around Shion's waist and rested his chin on Shion's shoulder, smirking to himself when Shion blushed.

"I guess I was more interested in studying," Shion said after he recovered. He leaned back against Nezumi, smiling at their closeness. "I kind of regret it now."

"It plays automatically," Nezumi told him, pulling away from Shion to press a button on the side of the piano; a beautiful, classical melody began playing, the keys pressing down and rising up again on their own rhythmically. Shion watched in awe and leaned down closer. "For when an actor who couldn't play piano had to pretend that he could."

"That's so cool," Shion said excitedly, straightening up again and grinning at Nezumi. "It sounds just like someone's playing."

"That's the point," Nezumi chuckled. He took Shion's hand and pulled him towards the center of the stage. "Can you dance, Shion?"

"E-Eh?" Shion blushed slightly and stuttered in surprise, before shaking his head. "No, I can't. I've never danced before."

"Never?" Nezumi question, and Shion shook his head. Nezumi wrapped an arm around Shion's waist and took Shion's hand in his other, guiding Shion's other hand to his shoulder. "Well, you're about to."

"I can't!" Shion insisted, tripping over his feet in surprise and slumping against Nezumi's chest. "I'm probably really lousy at it!"

"Probably, but let's try anyway," Nezumi said with a grin. He leaned down to press his lips against Shion's forehead before slowly leading him in the slow steps that accompanied the piece being automatically played by the invisible pianist at the old grand piano. "One two three, one two three..."

Shion was really very clumsy, after all; Shion tripped over his own feet more than once, and clung to Nezumi far too tightly for any of his steps to be considered graceful. But Nezumi supposed the way he danced was still delicate in a way. Shion was really trying very hard, paying close attention to Nezumi's footsteps and trying to discern a pattern in their placement. Soon enough, Shion caught on enough to stop stepping on Nezumi's feet, and stared seriously down at their feet in concentration, trying to get the hang of it. Nezumi laughed quietly and Shion blushed, embarrassed as he glared up at Nezumi.

"I've never danced before, so- Oh!"

He tripped over his feet again, distracted by their conversation, and almost fell over; he clung to Nezumi in order to keep himself upright, his arms tight around Nezumi's neck and Nezumi's arms instinctively winding around Shion's waist. "A-Ah, sorry, sensei..."

Shion looked up and found that they were incredibly close together- Shion could feel Nezumi's breath fan against his face and leaned in closer without thought, tilting his head up to press his lips against Nezumi's in a short, chaste kiss. After Shion drew back after a short moment, Nezumi immediately followed and kissed Shion again, pulling Shion closer against him. "S-Sensei, is it okay... here...?"

"No one's here," Nezumi murmured, kissing Shion again quickly. Shion hummed in agreement and kissed him back eagerly and enthusiastically. He stood up on his toes and reached up to tangle his fingers in Nezumi's hair. Shion still had trouble believing that things like that actually _happened_- that he was here, kissing Nezumi, who was his _boyfriend_. He had thought about it before, wished for it, but never actually expected it to happen. He never thought that someday he and Nezumi would actually be in this kind of relationship, where the two of them could hold hands and smile at each other and be together like this. But right then, Nezumi was kissing him in a way that he'd never kissed him before, so close together and their arms so tight around each other, and Shion knew this was the reality of it all and was grateful for it. Nezumi licked his bottom lip and he parted his lips in reply, and he felt his heart nearly burst when Nezumi's tongue slipped into his mouth. He wasn't used to kissing like this; after all, Nezumi was the only person he had ever kissed in his life. He slid his hands down to Nezumi's chest and gripped the fabric of his jacket tightly in his hands, titling his hands and kissing Nezumi back with the best of his ability.

The music played by the piano gradually silenced, and Shion slowly pulled back from Nezumi, slightly breathless and flushed. Nezumi leaned down and laid his forehead against Shion's and bumping their noses together, making Shion smile a little shyly. He leaned up to kiss Nezumi gently again. Nezumi smiled against his lips and then chuckled quietly. "You were right, you really _can't_ dance."

"Shut up," Shion grumbled, hiding his face in the crook of Nezumi's neck in embarrassment. "It's not like I ever learned how to."

"Come on, let's go," Nezumi said with a laugh, taking Shion's hand and leading him from the stage. As they passed by, Shion shut the lights off again, and once again the abandoned theater was shrouded in darkness. Shion thought that it looked kind of sad. "I don't think I want to come back to this place again."

"Why?" Shion asked curiously, looking back behind them as the two of them walked back into the main room. Shion looked up at Nezumi, who was looking around in a way that was slightly nostalgic.

"It's full of good memories... From when I was younger, and now with you. I don't want that to change," Nezumi responded, looking down at Shion. He grinned when Shion could only blush and smile in response and tugged on Shion's hand, leading him towards the door. "Come on, our date's not over yet."

Shion couldn't wait.

* * *

"Apologize to your mother for me, for keeping you out so late," Nezumi said as he pulled into Shion's driveway. Shion nodded in response and tightened his scarf around his neck, not too excited about getting out of the car and facing the cool air outside. He also knew that, the moment he stepped outside, their date would be over. Even knowing he'd see Nezumi tomorrow, he felt like it would be too long. "What's wrong?"

"It's cold outside," Shion huffed, and Nezumi laughed. Nezumi leaned over and pressed his lips against Shion's in a surprise, goodbye kiss.

"Don't keep your mama waiting," Nezumi chastised with a smirk, Shion blushing and stuttering in response. "I'll see you tomorrow."

"Right," Shion finally opened the car door and stepped outside, but before closing the door, he leaned down into the car again. "Hey, sensei?"

"Hmm?"

"There'll be a second date, too, wont there?"

It was Nezumi's turn to feel bashful; Shion's hopeful and shy expression always got to him, his innocence always too pure to bear. Nezumi nodded stiffly once. "Of course."

"Good," Shion said with a smile. "Bye-bye, sensei!"

Nezumi shook his head as he watched Shion disappear into his home. Shion would definitely be the death of him someday. Though, he had to admit, as he backed out of Shion's driveway and began on his way home, he'd probably be fine with that. Shion was Shion, after all.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

[1]= Just a Japanese college that I know very little of. =3 It was just the first one that came to my head~

I just HAD to put their dance in there. It was the BEST part of the anime, after all. :3 Well, that, and their kisses. But I digress. Thank you once again for reading, and please continue to leave your wonderful reviews! They keep me writing, and they're all so kind. ;u;


	11. Chapter Eleven

If you were to ask Safu when it was that the world stopped turning, she wouldn't be able to tell you for sure; was it when high school began? Before that? After that? Maybe time froze when Shion first smiled at her- perhaps the Earth stopped rotating when Safu's heart skipped a beat in response. So, no, she wouldn't be able to say for sure when it was that her carefully planned life started falling to pieces, but she knew that, whatever the time or place or circumstance, it was definitely Shion's fault.

Safu was incredibly fond of things that she could measure and calculate, and always viewed life as something she could plan and chisel down to her liking. Everything had an angle, a percentage, a volume and an area; a perimeter that she could count and then change to fit her preferences. She thought of life also as a trivial thing, something she could easily control; she was, after all, the smartest person she knew. School was so easy that it was almost tedious, and people were so dull that she hardly bothered dealing with them. So where, oh where, did she miscalculate? In which equation did she forget to carry a number? Where had she rounded off inaccurately? Falling in love was never one of her plans. She loved herself, needed only herself, and could rely on herself for anything she might need. So why did she love Shion more than science and percentages that rounded off nicely and looking towards the future? Why was it that when she now saw snow or clouds or daisies she didn't think of their place in nature, but of the color of Shion's hair? Why did rubies make her think of Shion's eyes, as opposed to their making and their place in the grand scheme of things? She was falling apart, she knew it, and she was falling hard and would, certainly, shatter into so many pieces that even she wouldn't be able to count them. Shion would fix her, of course. He would put her back together with sweet words and hope that he didn't even realize he was giving her; didn't he know that, by blushing and stuttering and smiling with her that he was making her love him more and more and more and more?

At first, Safu thought that she could fit Shion into her life; they could get married, they could have children and she could have a future that was bright and happy as well as successful and envious. She miscalculated once more by assuming that Shion was another factor that she could fit into her equations, and didn't expect him to ever love someone else. She should have expected it, though. She loved following the path she believed she was meant to follow, any other way simply wasn't worth her time, and if she ever toed near the boundary line between "what must be" and "what was" then she immediately straightened her ever-rigid posture and walked back on track; contrariwise, Shion went with wherever the wind was blowing that particular day, whether it be the roof of the school building or staring out the window in class or staring at the clouds instead of studying. This behavior would infuriate Safu, were it anyone else taking part in it. In Shion, she simply found it charming. Maybe that was _why_ she found Shion so charming, actually. He was so similar to her, a genius, and yet so different, a free spirit. It definitely drew her to him, like a chemical reaction or a magnetic attraction. It was natural, she supposed, that she loved him.

But if that were the case, would he love her as well? She wanted it to be so; she wanted it so, so much. He never looked at her that way, though. He never saw her as anything other than a dear friend. She knew that would never change the moment Shion began reading Shakespeare and poetry. He was gone and he was never coming back to her.

So why did she still hope?

* * *

"Safu, would color would you say rice is?"

"White," She replied, raising an eyebrow at him in amusement as he observed his sushi. They were, once again, having lunch together on the roof. The days were growing colder as the year grew older, but they just pulled on their jackets and ate there, anyway. "Isn't it obvious?"

"I mean, you could argue that it's more of a yellow-ish color," Shion countered, holding the piece of sushi out to her with his chopsticks. She lightly pushed it away from her, laughing.

"That's just because you have soy sauce on it."

"What about whole-grain rice, then? What color is that?"

"Brown."

"You could totally argue that whole-grain rice is a yellow-ish color, too," Shion grumbled. "What color is winter, then?"

"Winter doesn't have a color, Shion."

"It's blue," Shion corrected.

"How so?"

"It feels blue."

And when Shion lapsed into silence, falling backwards onto his back and staring up at the cloudy winter sky, Safu was captivated. Of course, with the way that the biting wind played with Shion's white curls, and the way his scarlet eyes reflected the sky and the clouds, Safu would never be able to look away. She closed her bento silently and straightened her skirt around her thighs, crossing her arms to shield herself from the cold and looking up at the clouds, slowly drifting across the winter sky. She took a deep breath of the frozen air and released it in a deep sigh, earning a question gaze from Shion. "I'm just dreading class, that's all."

"You? Dreading class?" Shion asked incredulously. He rolled onto his stomach and covered his head with his hands, exclaiming dramatically, "The sky is going to fall!"

"Very funny, Shion," Safu huffed, a light blush dusting her cheeks. Of course it was a lie that she was dreading class. She loved class. But it wasn't as though she could say, 'I'm absolutely in love with you, but I have a very strong suspicion that you're head over heels for a teacher.' "How about walking home together today?"

"I'm going to-"

"Never mind, stupid question," Safu grumbled. She immediately regretted her bitterness when she saw the hurt and guilty expression on Shion's face. "I have to stay after for student council duties, anyway."

"Let's walk home together tomorrow," Shion decided, smiling at her brightly. Safu blinked in surprise and looked down at Shion, who had rolled back over onto his back and was grinning up at her. "Friends are really important, and I haven't been spending enough time with you lately."

"Shion, that's not what I meant," Safu said apologetically, but Shion shook his head and his smile turned more gentle. Safu felt her heart race in response and bit her lip, trying to hold back her smile. "That was rude of me to say."

"I want to walk home with you," Shion repeated, slowly sitting up and running his hands through his hair, which was tousled after laying down. "It's been a long time."

"Thank you," Safu said quietly, glancing up to meet his kind gaze with her own bashful one. She couldn't hold back her smile this time, and the two of them laughed together.

* * *

She gave it an honest try, but Safu really couldn't get herself to like Shakespeare.

She decided to try to read _Hamlet_, but she couldn't see any of the words without a thin veil of bitterness around them. Because she knew, that with each soliloquy, with each act, Shion's eyes swept over those words and was thinking of /Nezumi/ the whole time. She knew that half of the reasons why Shion adored this story so much was because Nezumi was so fond of it. And because of this, she couldn't get herself to like it. She understood that it was childish of her, of course, and she knew that it was an extremely terrible attitude to have, but she couldn't really help it. She hated the heart-wrenching words, she hated Hamlet's wit, and she hated the eloquent flow of it all. She had nothing to calculate, nothing to divide by, and the only common variable of it all was Shion, Shion, Shion and how much he cared for Nezumi. Nezumi, that rotten teacher that ruined everything.

Safu scowled at the pages of _Hamlet_ and closed the book abruptly, sighing at her own childishness. She thought that she would come here, to this dimly-lit and sweet-smelling coffee shop with soft music drifting in the air around her, to this unfamiliar place and try to understand the things that Shion liked. She wanted to try to learn more than what she was taught in school, because Shion seemed to enjoy so many aspects of life that she was entirely ignorant of. He had such a love of springtime, of books and of sweet things and love, and Safu didn't feel any of that.

Safu paid for her drink, which was far too sweet for her, and left the shop in low spirits. She tightened she scarf around her neck and kept her eyes trained on the ground in front of her; left foot, right foot, left and then right again, in a trained and calculated manner that seemed so _correct_ to her that it was almost painful. Could she live, if not for perimeters and measurements? She knew the answer to that, of course, and it scared her. She was so caught up in her thoughts that she wasn't paying attention to where she was walking and what she was doing, that she ran right into someone who was looking into a shop window, inadvertently knocking the stranger's drink onto the ground.

"Oh, forgive me," Safu said quickly, reaching down to pick up the fallen paper cup of coffee, but the damage was already done and the liquid was running down the sidewalk. "I wasn't paying attention to where I was going, I apologize."

"No permanent damage was done," a smooth voice replied, and Safu cursed herself before looking up and meeting the gaze of the same teacher that was plaguing her thoughts. "Ah, it's Shion's friend."

"Safu," she introduced herself, standing up and awkwardly playing with her scarf. "I'm very sorry about your drink, sensei. Allow me to buy you another one."

"It's fine," Nezumi answered, raising an eyebrow at her forced politeness. Safu hated the way he so clearly saw right through her. "I couldn't make a student pay for my bad habits."

"If you insist," Safu said in an almost cool tone. She wasn't going to push it; after all, it wasn't as though she really wanted to do anything kind for that man, anyway. "I should be getting home."

"Of course," Nezumi said with a nod, and walked past her. When he got a few feet away, however, Safu turned around and called out to him.

"Sensei," Safu said loudly, and he turned around to face her. "Shion will be walking home with me tomorrow."

Something flashed in Nezumi's eyes, and to any other person it might seem threatening. Safu, however, took it was a challenge. Their eyes met, and although there were people walking past and in between them, and there were several loud conversations taking place in the street around them, they had an unspoken conversation with their eyes. Nezumi loved Shion, and Safu loved Shion. Neither of them would give up and they both understood that. The moment was short lived, however, and Nezumi smirked in a way that was infuriating to Safu.

"That's fine," Nezumi said, turning around again. "Because he was with me today."

Safu never felt more alone in a street full of people.

* * *

Shion understood that Safu loved him now. She said it to him, and, although he was completely oblivious to it at first, he now saw it in all of the little things she did and said when around him; Shion was an extremely intelligent person. He knew that Safu's eyes stayed on him for a fraction of a second longer than was usual between two friends, he knew that she sat two and a half inches closer to him than she needed to when they ate lunch together. And it made him extremely upset that he was constantly hurting her, and it hurt even more that he knew he couldn't do anything about it. He wasn't going to lie to her and pretend that he feelings were reciprocated, because that would be far too cruel. Plus, there was someone else in his life that he loved wholly.

"Shion, you don't usually text so much," Safu noted during lunch the next day, frowning slightly as Shion's phone vibrated yet again. Shion pulled his phone out of his pocket and flipped it open, smiling to himself as he read the message.

_'You shouldn't be texting during school, young man. What if a teacher finds out?'_

"A-Ah, it's my mom," Shion lied quickly, and Safu raised an eyebrow at him. "Okay, no it's not."

Shion looked back down at his phone and contemplated how to respond, biting his lip in concentration. He settled for, _'Maybe you're just a bad influence. I would never text during school before I met you.'_

_'I'm glad I'm making an impact. Hey, meet me after school before you walk home with Safu.'_

Shion bit his lip to hold back a smile, unaware of Safu's eyes on him as he did so. She shifted uncomfortably, clearing her throat. "Shion."

"Sorry, sorry!" Shion quickly responded with _'See you then.'_ before snapping his phone shut and putting it away in his bag. "No more delinquency from me, I promise."

"Don't make promises you can't keep, Shion," Safu said dryly, smiling ruefully. "You're eating lunch on the roof."

"All right, good point," Shion laughed, and Safu felt herself getting lost in the sound of it. But she knew that, even though she was thinking about him, he was thinking about Nezumi. And it hurt more than any number could describe.

* * *

"Sensei," Shion called out into the classroom, closing the door behind him as he did so. He turned around and didn't see Nezumi anywhere, and frowned to himself before taking a few steps closer to the desk up front. He didn't want to take too long; although he always wanted to spend as much time with Nezumi as he could, he made a promise to Safu and didn't want to keep her waiting. "Sensei?"

"Oh, Shion," Nezumi greeted, appearing from inside his supply closet/personal library. He grinned and walked over to Shion, lightly tapping him on top of the head with the book in his hand. "Hey."

"Hey," Shion replied, smiling up at him shyly. He bit his lip nervously, shifting his weight to one leg and adjusting his grip on his schoolbag. "I probably shouldn't stay too long. I'm walking home with Safu today."

"I know, I wont keep you," Nezumi said slightly reluctantly, tossing his book over onto his desk. "I just wanted to see you today."

Shion beamed in response, before tilting his head in confusion. "Oh, yeah. How did you know about that?"

"I ran into Safu yesterday evening. Well, more accurately, Safu ran into me yesterday evening. The two of you have that in common," Nezumi explained. A strange expression crossed his face as he said so. "That reminds me, there's something I wanted to say."

"Then say it, by all means," Shion said curiously, wondering what it was. He blushed slightly and made a small noise of surprise when Nezumi suddenly took Shion into his arms and lifted him up on to of the desk, placing both hands on either side of him. Nezumi trapped Shion there with him arms and leaned up so his face was pressed against the side of Shion's neck; Shion could feel his breath and it made him shudder. "S-Sensei...?"

"Safu loves you," Nezumi breathed, and Shion felt extremely _warm_ all of a sudden, and found it slightly difficult to remember how to breathe. Shion wasn't sure what to do with his hands, trapped between the two of them, and settled on tentatively running his fingers along the collar of Nezumi's shirt. "And she wants to be with you."

"Y-Yes," Shion admitted, very aware of this fact himself. Nezumi tilted his head up slightly, his lips pressed against Shion's jaw. "I'm sorry."

Nezumi chuckled against Shion's skin and it made Shion tremble again. "It's nothing to apologize for. I just wanted to make sure you knew something."

Nezumi pulled back slightly and stood up straight, his arms still on either side of them but their heights were a little more equal. Shion's hands slid down to the front of Nezumi's shirt and Shion looked at Nezumi expectantly.

"I'll _never_ let anyone else have you."

And _oh_, Nezumi was kissing him and Shion's world was on fire. In the back of his throat, he moaned quietly; and it embarrassed him, because he wasn't sure if it was a noise of surprise or a noise of something very different. Whatever it was, Nezumi's hands were on Shion's hips in response and the two of them were even closer. There wasn't even enough room between them for Shion's hands and they retreated around Nezumi's shoulders, where they were equally welcome and where Shion's fingers found access to Nezumi's hair. Shion could so easily lose himself in moments like these, where his hand were tangled in Nezumi's hair and he was enveloped in Nezumi's warmth and where, suddenly but not unexpectedly, Nezumi's tongue ran across Shion's lower lip and Shion couldn't do anything but open his mouth in a quiet moan in response, and, well, that just made Nezumi pull him even /closer/ and Nezumi was pressing one of his legs between both of Shion's, which were hanging off the desk, and Shion couldn't seem to hold Nezumi tight enough and Nezumi hummed softly when Shion tried and-

"Ah-"

Safu stood in the entrance of the classroom, her eyes slightly wide. But she wasn't surprised, of course not, that wasn't the expression on her face; hurt, betrayed, lonely, sad, denial, and regret but no, there wasn't surprise there. By opening the door she knew exactly what she was going to see but she was a scientist, so she needed the proof, she needed peer-review and she needed to edit and test her hypothesis. And she was right, of course, like she always was. But it still hurt to see the two of them tangled together, so clearly in love and Safu so clearly _alone_.

"Safu-" Shion began, the strongest of regret etched across his face. Safu just turned back around and ran down the hallway, her footsteps echoing through the empty school. "Safu!"

"No," Nezumi murmured, feeling equally guilty. He held Shion back when he tried to get up to follow Safu. "She'll want to be alone."

"I told her we'd walk home together," Shion protested, but it was weak and he sighed deeply, resting his head on Nezumi's shoulder. "I made a promise."

"I know, Shion. I'm sorry."

* * *

Safu saw everything mathematically, algebraically, logically. But, for the moment, she couldn't really see anything through the blur of her tears as she ran down the sidewalk. The usually loud and blunt voice in her thoughts, the one that told her to study and told her to stand a little straight, was whispering that she knew it, of course, she knew it all along, but the softer voice that came from her heart gently told her _you can cry, it's okay, because your heart is broken and it's okay to hurt_.

So she sunk to her knees, right there on the sidewalk, and cried into her hands. It wasn't the eloquent crying that's described in stories or on television; it was breathless and desperate and it was hard for Safu to hear anything over her own sobs. And it was cold, and her tears left cold tracks on her face that felt like ice, though she didn't bother trying to wipe it away. She kept telling herself she was silly, oh silly her, oh silly her, how stupid she's been all this time. She knew Shion was in love with that teacher, that bastard of a teacher that seduced Shion with stories and love and warm evenings with hot chocolate that Safu had never known. There were so many things that Safu knew, and yet even more that Safu longed to know; some of those things, however, were things that Safu would never know, because they were written in some story that Safu would never understand. One of those things was Shion's love.

Safu saw everything as an equation, as something that she could figure out and deduce. However, even she couldn't count how many tears she cried that day. Her eyes hurt and she was so cold and her throat was turning sore, but she didn't care. For once, she wanted to be a girl who felt instead of calculated.

She hadn't realized that being real _hurt_ so much.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Okay, I'm sorry. I know it's been a really long time, and I hope this chapter makes up for it! Obviously, it's very Safu-centric, but I really do love her character. I truly think that Safu doesn't get enough credit. And I do realize that some of you may find this chapter to be a bit slow, but there are a few things I want to get written and uploaded before I continue down the more dramatic plotline. But it will come, dear readers, it will come. =3

Thank you for reading! As always, I love you all so dearly!


	12. Chapter 12

Since he and Shion started dating, Nezumi had decided that it was his personal mission to learn everything about Shion that he possibly could. He knew the little, almost unimportant and obvious things at this point; that Shion liked sweets and disliked bitter things, that he did his homework almost immediately after lessons let out, and that, ironic in comparison to the last comment, he was never on time for anything. He was air-headed but good-hearted, kind and oblivious but in a good way. Shion was just an all around pleasant person to be around. Nezumi knew that, but everyone else knew that, too, so it wasn't good enough for him.

He also learned about the things that Shion _loved_, as opposed to the little things that he just liked. He didn't discover anything that really surprised him, but it _did_ make him love Shion all the more.

To start with, Shion made the most interesting expressions when he read. When he thought a particular sentence flowed particularly smoothly while reading Shakespeare, he had the smallest of smiles on his face, biting his bottom lip in a crooked way. When he didn't understand something, be it stanza or prose, he held the page slightly closer to him, squinting and pressing his lips together more tightly, his tongue protruding slightly. He was so completely absorbed in whatever it was he read, oblivious to everything else around him. Nezumi found it extremely amusing, too, when two hours have past and Shion suddenly snapped back to the present and looked around wildly, completely having forgotten where and who he was and what he was doing. And Shion would always mark his page in the exact same way, by bending the upper right corner the in a small, perfect right triangle. Always the perfectionist.

Shion also loved to listen to things. It sounds strange, but he loved to close his eyes or stare off into space and just /listen/; to the wind when it pushed at the leaves and pulled at the grass, to the rain when it pounded on the windows and the pavement, to the muffled conversations of all the people around them. But most of all, Shion loved to listen to Nezumi read to him. He would lean against Nezumi's legs, when they were in his apartment or in his classroom, and listen to Nezumi's voice while he read from his beloved books and stories. He would lean his head back against Nezumi's knees and look up at the ceiling, hugging his knees. Or, sometimes, on the afternoons when they could spend time in Nezumi's apartment, Shion would lay with his head resting in Nezumi's lap and his legs hanging out the edge of the couch. This was Nezumi's favorite way to read with Shion, because Shion's hands would wander. He would tug at Nezumi's shirt sleeves or reach up to play with stray strands of Nezumi's hair; or, sometimes, if he was lost in the sound of Nezumi's voice and the story, he would brush his fingers against Nezumi's cheeks, his neck, or gently across his collar bones before realizing what he was doing and pulling his hand back, blushing furiously and avoiding Nezumi's gaze. Nezumi loved those moments even more than Shion did.

Lastly, Shion really, _really_ loved the snow.

Nezumi first noticed on a cold afternoon in early December, when the two of them were sitting in his classroom and each lost in their own activity; Nezumi was, as always, grading papers, and Shion was humming to himself with an open text book in his lap. His gaze, however, was trained on the window, and he couldn't seem to help but glance up at it every few minutes or so. Nezumi found it to be extremely distracting and eventually glanced over at Shion with a raised eyebrow. "Shion?"

"Mmm?" Shion straightened up, eyes meeting Nezumi's. Nezumi glanced pointedly at the window and Shion blushed very slightly, just a pink dusting across his cheeks. "A-Ah, well. I was hoping it would snow."

"Snow?" Nezumi repeated. "It's cold enough to, so I guess it's possible."

"Will you build a snowman with me if it does?" Shion asked with a grin, half teasing. Nezumi laughed and leaned back in his desk chair.

"I doubt it'll snow enough," Nezumi replied. "Where would we build it?"

"Oh, good question," Shion mumbled, and tilted his head as he considered the dilemma. "The roof?"

"We'd have to build an army," Nezumi teased, and Shion nodded quickly in agreement, a serious expression on his face. "At least thirty."

"I don't think that's enough to be an army, sensei."

And they didn't talk about the snow anymore after that, their conversation drifting away towards other things. It didn't end up snowing, and Shion's disappointed expression made even Nezumi upset that it hadn't snowed. Nezumi wrapped an arm around Shion's waist and pressed a kiss to his temple, smiling against his hair when Shion stuttered and blushed in surprise. "Maybe it'll snow tomorrow."

But it didn't snow the next day, or the day after that. It wasn't until that weekend that Shion finally got his wish.

The two of them were sitting in Nezumi's apartment Saturday evening, the sun just barely set. Shion was cuddled up against Nezumi's side with Nezumi's arm around his shoulder, and Shion was drifting off against Nezumi's shoulder, absent-mindedly playing with Nezumi's fingers as Nezumi aimlessly flipped through the channels on the TV, never lingering on a particular program for more than two seconds. Eventually, Nezumi sighed in resignation and shut off the TV. He looked down at Shion and smiled to himself, running his fingers lightly through Shion's hair as he slept peacefully. He knew it was getting late, and he should probably wake Shion and drive him home, but he was so _comfortable_. Shion's weight was warm against his side and he shifted slightly in his sleep. Nezumi decided he could spare a few more minutes and settled more comfortably on the couch, his eyes wandering around the room. His gaze froze on the window of the balcony and had expected to see the last of the day's light grow crimson and then black; however, the sky was already dark, and specks of white were scattered against the glass.

"Shion," Nezumi murmured, ruffling Shion's hair in an attempt to wake him. "Shion, guess what?"

"Mmm?" Shion grumbled, slowly opening his eyes and blinking slowly up at Nezumi, tilting his head. Nezumi's heart pounded at the sight, why was Shion so /adorable/, and nodded towards the window. "What?"

"It's snowing," Nezumi said quietly, and Shion sat up straighter, his head snapping in the direction of the window. A smile spread across his face and he looked back at Nezumi, his eyes bright.

"It's snowing," Shion repeated, smiling even wider at the words. He stood up and stretched the last of his sleepiness away before grabbing Nezumi's hand and tugging him off the couch. "Come on."

"It's freezing, Shion," Nezumi protested, but he didn't resist as Shion lead him across the room in the direction of the balcony, stepping over Cravat, who was sleeping on the floor in front of the TV. He raised his head as they passed, blinking sleepily at them before decided that they weren't that important and curling up again.

Shion slid the door open, and shivered the moment they stepped outside. He looked up at the sky, and at the thin layer of snow covering the railing, and then back up at Nezumi with a grin on his face. "It's pretty, isn't it?"

"You're not even wearing shoes."

"Neither are you."

"You'll get sick."

"You'll take care of me," Shion said cheekily, and Nezumi rolled his eyes. He wrapped his arms around Shion's waist and rested his chin on top of Shion's hair, cold and wet from the snow. Shion leaned back against Nezumi's chest and breathed in the almost-winter air, looking up at the slowly falling snowflakes. "They kind of look like stars."

"Hm?"

"Like small, frozen stars," Shion clarified, covering Nezumi's arms with his own, and Nezumi felt Shion's warmth. "I think there are probably more snowflakes than stars. I don't know, I could never count either of them."

"I'm not sure," Nezumi admitted, ignoring the wind biting at his cheeks in favor of relishing in Shion's soft voice in the silence that could only ever be caused by snow. It muffled everything, and even the city seemed quiet as the two of them stood in the snow. "But Shion?"

"Yeah?"

"You're prettier than the snow."

"Don't say things like that," Shion murmured, turning around in Nezumi's arms, reaching up to wrap his arms around Nezumi's neck. He gave Nezumi a stern expression, though the blush on his face took away from the effect. "I'm still a boy, you know."

"Boys can be pretty," Nezumi defended. "It's a compliment."

"Well, thank you," Shion replied, standing on his toes to give Nezumi a quick kiss.

"Bold of you," Nezumi commented, leaning down to kiss Shion's retreating lips. He loved when Shion did unexpected things like that, since he was usually so timid and shy about their relationship. When Shion's arms tightened around his neck he laughed into their kiss, pulling back slightly. "We should go inside."

"You're not very romantic," Shion complained. "People are supposed to kiss in the snow."

"I don't think they are."

"It's _romantic_."

"We'll get sick."

"Fine," Shion said with a sigh, stepping around Nezumi to go back inside the apartment. "I swear, whenever I try to have a nice moment with you, you always push me away. This must be what it's like to be oppressed."

"Don't act like such a child," Nezumi teased, and Shion stuck his tongue out at him in response, eliciting a chuckle from the older man. Shion made his way toward the couch again, and Nezumi knew it was getting late, and that he should definitely take Shion home before the snow made he roads particularly dangerous. But Shion sat down and looked up at him with the sweetest smile on his face, his cheeks still flushed and rosy from the cold.

"I don't want to go home yet," Shion said quietly, looking up at him and then away shyly, crossing his ankles and shifting on the couch. "Five more minutes?"

What else could Nezumi do? He had no choice but to immediately take Shion's face in his hands and kiss his lips, to smile at Shion's small gasp of surprise before he grabbed the front of Nezumi's shirt to pull him closer, to sit down next to him and forget, forget that Shion was still young and that Nezumi was a teacher and that everything in the universe was against their relationship. He felt the memory of the cold wind leave Shion's skin as his fingers brushed over it, over Shion's cheeks and his neck and his collar bone, his fingers and wrists. And if Shion whimpered, _whimpered_, when Nezumi deepened their kiss and tugged at Nezumi's hair in response, well, then it was only natural that he wouldn't be able to refuse.

"Let's make it fifteen," Nezumi murmured, before kissing Shion again.

* * *

**Author's Note:**

Guys, I know it's short**, **but I felt so bad about leaving you guys so long without an update. This is really just purely fluff, and has nothing to do with the storyline itself, but it's cute. =3 I'm still having trouble with how I want to proceed, and it's driving my craaaaazy.

I'm sorry for the wait. Thank you for putting up with me for this long!


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